James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Senator's amendment speaks to some of the core issues addressed by the Bill and to the debate concerning the regulation of gambling advertising. The purpose of the amendment is to introduce an absolute prohibition on advertising gambling and provides for the offences for a breach of that prohibition. Unfortunately, I cannot accept it. As Senators will be aware, a key focus of the Bill is to protect children and vulnerable people from the harms associated with gambling. The Bill includes restrictions on gambling advertising and on sponsorship by gambling service providers.These restrictions include a watershed prohibiting the broadcast of gambling advertising on television, radio and audiovisual media services as recommended by the all-party Oireachtas committee, and a wide-ranging power to allow the authority to prescribe times, places and events where gambling advertising can be broadcast, displayed or published, as well as the volume, frequency and duration of advertisements. This power will also allow the the authority to address gambling, advertising online and on traditional media such as television, radio, websites, apps, in print in publications and outdoor advertising such as billboards.

In addition, the Bill contains extensive measures to regulate gambling advertising on on-demand services, on social media or video-sharing services and via other forms of electronic communications such as telephone texts, messages or via email.

On Report Stage in the Dáil I brought amendments to make it an enforceable obligation on licensees to comply with the advertising provisions in the Bill and that any breach of an obligation may be addressed by the authority by way of administrative sanction or, if the breach is of a significant nature, by criminal prosecution if necessary. Such administrative sanctions could potentially include a significant financial penalty, the suspension, revocation of or imposition of a condition on the licensee's gambling licence and on any other licences held by the licensee.

In addition to the amendments I intend to bring to exempt charitable philanthropic licensees from the advertising restrictions in the Bill, I also intend to introduce further restrictions to ensure that no commercial operators can take advantage of these exemptions.

I do not think that any of the Senators would disagree that it would be disproportionate and time-consuming to seek a prosecution as provided for in their amendment and potentially imprisoning someone for failure to include any information required in an advertisement by the authority, or for a failure to use the right font, for example. These are matters the authority should be addressing.

The approach in the Bill gives the authority more flexibility in addressing any breaches of the advertising measures in the Bill and will allow it to react proportionately and quickly while still allowing it to address any breach by criminal prosecution for serious breaches where it deems necessary to do so.

As I have previously stated, I have concerns about adopting an absolute ban on advertising from the outset. Gambling is a lawful and legitimate activity and the Bill, as amended by the Dáil, further empowers the authority to be able to react and regulate advertising accordingly. The Bill will still provide that gambling advertisement must include details of licensees' registration with the authority and this information will inform the public about who is a lawfully regulated entity licensed to operate in the State and will protect participants and assist them with recourse to the authority. An absolute prohibition would muddy the waters and lead to confusion as to who is licensed to be a legitimate operator and who is not. Our intention is to protect people participating in gambling and not to inadvertently facilitate unlicensed operators. I hope that the Senators will accept the Government's policy approach in this situation.