“It’s rife”: recovering gambling addict wants crack down on betting ads

Local TV

A recovering gambling addict from Bridgend says that he wants to see less gambling adverts on our screens and sports. He says that too many young people are getting into gambling from a young age without even realise what they’re doing is gambling.

Transcript

00:00But when it comes to drinking and alcohol and drugs, you've got to go to the shop or find a dealer and stuff like that.

00:10With gambling, you've just got to pick up your phone, click, bang, all gone.

00:14Aled says that gambling was always part of his life without ever really realising it.

00:19From a young age at amusement arcades to the odd bet on sports, which spiralled into a fully-fledged addiction.

00:24And it took rock bottom for him to finally get out of it.

00:27But from a young age, I was an avid rugby player.

00:31I was always in social clubs, rugby clubs, sports clubs.

00:34We used to go on holidays to Haven, caravan parks.

00:38I was always in arcades, claw machines, bandits, even two-pee pushers.

00:43People don't think that's gambling, but it is.

00:45And that's how I got exposed to it.

00:49And it was just the norm growing up, putting a bet on you, buying a scratch card there, jumping on the slot machine.

00:57And as I got older, in hindsight, it was getting worse.

01:02And then for me personally, like dormant for a couple of years, I had a new baby boy, a new job.

01:07I moved areas with my partner and stuff.

01:12And then I had this job, and it just went downhill from there.

01:16Then mental health went down the pan.

01:19Other addictions arose from my mental health state at the time.

01:24And the gambling addiction just skyrocketed.

01:28And I'm uncomfortable to say it now because it's part of my history.

01:32But I ended up breaking the law to fund that gambling addiction.

01:36And that's where my life started to turn around when I got caught stealing from work to fund the addiction.

01:44And that's where I was like, right, I need serious help.

01:47It's that subtle gambling that's made its way into young people's lives that's a real issue that Alid wants to see fixed.

01:53With things like trading card games, planting seeds for kids who don't even realise that they're gambling.

01:58Yeah, back then it wasn't like a gambling thing.

02:02You were just buying packs of cards, trading them, having fun.

02:05But now that world of collecting cards, not just Pokemon cards, you've got the football cards, you've got Formula One cards.

02:16You've got cards for Darth players now, Luke the Nuke on, and it's just wild.

02:21And you've got influencers then buying rare packs, encouraging other kids then.

02:28They might not be saying it or go out and buy it.

02:30But kids are like, oh, if I buy this one back, I could hit a £50 card.

02:35And I've got my money back and I can buy more packs.

02:37And it's just, yeah, it is rife.

02:41Alid is a recovering gambling addict.

02:42And he says he's seen incredibly low pints during his life.

02:46But says that there is a real risk of plenty more people falling into the same problems as himself.

02:51So he believes a gambling addiction isn't given the same level of respect and attention of things like alcohol or drug addictions.

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