Mr. Pádraig Ó Ríordáin:

I am the chief legal officer and group commercial director for Flutter Entertainment, the global Irish company that is headquartered here in Ireland. I am accompanied by Conor Grant, who is chief executive officer of Flutter UK and Ireland. We are delighted to participate in this session today. We have made a detailed submission to the committee and sincerely hope that we can constructively assist in its very welcome and important work in this area. Flutter fully supports the establishment of a well-resourced, evidence-led gambling regulatory authority which is given broad powers by legislation to respond to a quickly evolving industry. This is an important point to emphasise as there is a popular misconception that gambling companies are against regulation, whereas the opposite is the case.

Flutter’s business model is based on regulated markets and we hold licenses in more than 20 countries and 12 US states. Ireland is our home, where the business was founded, and we very much want it to have a world class regulatory system for our industry. Flutter Entertainment is one of Ireland’s largest listed companies and a global leader in the gambling sector. Ireland is one half of our UK and Ireland division, from which we operate the Paddy Power, Sky Betting and Gaming and Betfair brands. We employ 1,600 people in our Dublin HQ, along with a further 1,400 colleagues in 265 Paddy Power shops located in every county in the State. In total, we have approximately 17,000 employees and more than 14 million active customers across the globe. In 2021, we contributed more than €125.5 million in taxes to the Irish Exchequer and we are major supporters of the Irish horse racing industry.

In the conversation about gambling it is often unsaid that the vast majority of people gamble for fun and do so safely. From the Listowel Races to the All-Ireland finals, people the length and breadth of Ireland like a punt, whether it is yearly on the Grand National or once a week on a football accumulator. With the development of digital betting and gaming services, we need a strong regulator to ensure all gambling companies in Ireland work to reduce harm to customers for whom gambling becomes a problem. In addition, Irish punters should be protected against the dangers of unregulated offshore operators. As a company, we accept that we have not always got it right in the past. However, we have learned from other markets and made significant voluntary, proactive strides to protect customers in Ireland. We have greatly increased the resources we dedicate to protecting our customers from harm. Today, more than 180 full-time employees are dedicated to safer gambling across our UK and Ireland operations and these are very energetic, dedicated people.

Important initiatives we have recently introduced include a mandatory €500 per month net deposit limit for all customers under the age of 25; a ban on customers using credit cards across online and retail; and a pre-watershed whistle to whistle advertising ban that restricts advertising during live sport. In addition, Flutter has committed to materially increase its contribution to support research, education and treatment of problem gambling to 1% of net gaming revenue in Ireland by next year. However, none of these initiatives is currently required of the industry as a whole in Ireland.

The legislative challenge is to strike the right balance between allowing the vast majority who enjoy gambling safely to do so while protecting those who are vulnerable to experiencing harm from their gambling.