The Social Market Foundation were one of the primary advocates of affordability checks on gambling. And now it’s failing, they want to stop it. Perhaps they shouldn’t have been so arrogant and zealous in the first place and listened to the warnings.
The Social Market Foundation, the left leaning think-tank, has called on the UK government to reconsider its approach to affordability checks, warning that current measures risk undermining their original purpose.
Dr James Noyes, senior adviser at the SMF, urged the DCMS to “hit pause” on financial risk checks being piloted by the Gambling Commission. Writing to Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy, he raised concerns about transparency, inconsistent data and unclear outcomes.
No shit. It’s a bit late in the day to realise how incredibly wrong you actually were.
So Why did you propose it then?
The SMF were so consumed by self-righteousness and the pursuit of their prohibition purity crusade, they refused to even acknowledge these very same criticisms lodged by the industry at the time affordability checks were first raised.
It’s an embarrassing row-back by the SMF, and one that will certainly damage the Foundation’s credibility – screaming for affordability checks at the very outset, ignoring all the warnings at the time, and then saying oopsy poopsy someone might have got this wrong. Well, I’m not sure that works, and it certainly shouldn’t go unchallenged.
Who’s the guilty party?
Trust in the SMF should be on the floor. But hold on a sec, give them their due – they’ve written to the DCMS.
Apparently someone’s got affordability checks wrong, although it’s not certain who?
“Despite the White Paper’s claim that financial risk checks would be frictionless, recent reports suggest that the opposite is the case,” Noyes wrote, citing “increasing reports that the pilot scheme has involved inconsistent data, unclear outcomes and unnecessary friction”.
Ah, it’s the legislators to blame, or is it the Gambling Commission?
Noyes went on to admonish that there has been “no update on the financial risk assessment pilot, or its evaluation, since May 2025”.
One thing that seems to be very clear, it definitely sounds like it’s not those who advocated affordability checks 2-3 years ago.
The unrepentant
Introduced in 2024, the scheme was meant to apply “light-touch” checks to players’ deposits, but critics argue it intrudes on personal finances. The racing industry has been particularly vocal, warning of significant financial losses.
Noyes, now on the defensive, continued to pledge his backing for affordability checks in principle, but he stressed they must remain proportionate and non-intrusive.
“My support for affordability checks was done on the basis that there would be adequate oversight and evaluation of their efficacy,” he concluded, some might say a little priggishly, and almost definitely passing the buck-ingly.
We need to talk about the Commission…
Whilst Noyes and his crew at the SMF should be held accountable, where does all this leave the Gambling Commission?
It’s hapless at the best of times, so what can the assessment be at this current worst of times?
The regulator has taken the deny til you die stance on affordability checks since they were implemented – and it has defended its input like a Jehovah’s Witness peddling the bible on a street corner.
Confidence in the Commission will never be high, we all recognise that, but it certainly works hard making sure it stays that way.
We have a Gambling Act Review consultation on the go and a Gambling Commission’s fee consultation also under consideration.
Affordability checks are yet another poster boy of the failings of the GAR, and as for the Gambling Commission fees, why on earth should the amusements, gaming and gambling industry pay for every project GamCom launches with gusto and then fails at it.
The GC fee consultation should be an investigation into the regulator rather than how much more money it gets in a 30 percent increase begging bowl. There are plenty that say you can throw Elon Musk’s riches at them and they’d still fail.
And as for the GAR review – really, you need a review to work out that it’s been a total disaster.
Seven years we’ve been waiting for legislation that would bring the industry into the digital era, and we’re barely out of the prehistoric one.
But then, that is where the mindset of the government, the regulator and organisations like the SMF are most comfortable.
The long and winding road…to nowhere
Coinslot said… “Seven years we’ve been waiting for legislation that would bring the industry into the digital era, and we’re barely out of the prehistoric era…
Originally published on Coinslot on April 19, 2026. Republished with permission.