Online-Casinos.com – The United Kingdom was one of the first jurisdictions to regulate online gambling and it has been a roaring success for the most part. Now though there has been a great deal of debate in the parliament about the changes gambling has undergone over the past few years.
Much of the controversy has been focused on the introduction and proliferation of fixed odds betting terminals and their potentially damaging impact on economically struggling communities. Online and on land betting service providers have been ramping up their efforts to get more people punting. The push for online betting has seen the introduction of online bingo, sports, casino and poker offerings being advertized everywhere leading to more gambling in general.
Gambling policy is being reviewed in the U.K. led by Labour putting the pressure on the coalition to rethink the current state of affairs. The Gambling Commission used current gambling outlet data to estimate that there were over 33,000 fixed odds betting terminals in the UK in 2012, with an average weekly profit for the company of £825 which totals £1.42 billion. Statistics also reveal that online casinos are attracting as many punters as in those who attend casinos in person and virtual gaming machines in bookmaker’s outlets are also becoming increasingly popular.
The Gambling Commission’s latest figures show that 55% of the UK regularly gambles, this is down from 57% in 2012.
It has been suggested that the machines are taking advantage of the less fortunate demographic in society as well as the youth of the nation ages 18 to 24 that are now 5 percent more likely to gamble than last year. The use of the internet is more pronounced among the younger set possibly accounting for the increased participation in games of chance.
The government earns a great deal of money from these machines and gambling with earnings in 2012-13 amounting to £1.7 billion.
