Teaching Quality

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I want to highlight four issues that explain why I am against the Opposition motion. The first is that inspirational teachers come to the classroom through many routes, and sometimes the most unconventional backgrounds can be the most inspiring to pupils. The second is the importance of trusting and empowering heads to be the leaders they are appointed to be under the “use them or lose them” principle. Third is the importance of embracing working and learning in today’s global environment, and fourth is the critical need to bridge the worlds of education and industry if we are to compete successfully in that global race.
I like to think that, like me, every child who goes through education has a truly inspirational teacher who has an influence on them for the rest of their life. For me, it was the lady who taught me German during my final years at school. There were four of us in our A-level class. She was a truly remarkable woman and I learned as much from her about character as about language. Being German, she could convey the language well, but what was truly remarkable about her—it is fitting to mention this this week as we remember the holocaust—was that, as we understood it, she and her father had helped Jewish children to escape from Germany to Britain during the second world war, and then had to leave the country. That gave her an understanding, which she conveyed through language and literature, of compassion and common humanity, of endurance and perseverance, of selflessness and humility, and of the right priorities for life. I have never forgotten. She taught me that no insignificant person has ever been born, that every individual has the capacity to make a remarkable difference, and that we should all strive to do so. When she arrived in this country, she had no relevant qualifications for teaching here. She had the life she had lived, which was worth far more than any paper certificate when she was teaching us.
That brings me to my second point—giving heads the discretion to appoint the best staff for their school and allowing them the freedom to exercise leadership in the role entrusted to them. For almost 20 years, I was governor of a small inner-city independent faith school in one of the most deprived areas of Salford. It was started as a home school by an inspirational teacher,
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who found other parents asking her to take in their children. She took on a building—the Victorian building where the first ragged school in Manchester was housed. She taught those children and led many of them to become doctors, teachers and other professionals.
When she needed a physics teacher, she found one from somewhere—someone who had retired or someone from business. She did similar with music teachers and teachers of many other subjects. She provided a special education in a small class environment. Most of the children would never have flourished had they gone to schools elsewhere in the city. They needed that individual help and support. Her dedication enthused and pervaded the whole school. To have inhibited her from exercising that initiative and from appointing staff of her choice would have been a travesty and a tragic waste of her leadership skills.
Thirdly, we talk about working, living and competing in a global environment, and about preparing our young people for that. In that case, we must pay more than lip service. Increasingly, many of our school leavers travel abroad to get a business degree from Maastricht, or for a soccer scholarship at James Madison in the USA. A large number of those people will feel led to pass on the benefit of their training to younger children. Why should they not do so following the example of the qualified football coach employed by St Mary’s Church of England primary school at Dilwyn, who was appointed to teach PE at key stages 1 and 2; the professional actor appointed by Langley free school in Slough as a drama teacher; or the professional singer appointed there to teach music?
Chris Skidmore: That is the nub of the argument. Slapping on QTS as a compulsory requirement will put off many people from a variety of professions from entering teaching, which would be a tragedy.
Fiona Bruce: My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and in that connection, I want to talk about the importance of strengthening the relationship of the educational environment we provide for young people with the world of work, which is critical if we are to give young people sufficient information for them to make the right career decisions. In order to do so, they need to make an early choice of subjects and to have inspirational teachers who understand the world of work and have experience of it.
Stephen McPartland: Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to reduce the gap between education and employment, and focus more on employability, so that we can reduce youth unemployment?
Fiona Bruce: That is exactly the point I am making. We must bridge that divide. Connecting children from the start of secondary school or even earlier with people who have been involved in the world of work, who can inform, encourage and inspire them, is what we need.
Many teachers come from backgrounds that children would never otherwise have an opportunity to understand. On the bridging of the cultural divide between education and the industrial world, a former leader of an Asda sales team is teaching business studies at Priory community school in Weston-super-Mare and is head of upper school. He is bringing the world of work right into the classroom.
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Bridging education and industry is key. It would be wrong to inhibit schools that are intent on appointing enthusiastic teaching staff with knowledge of the world of work simply because they lack a piece of paper headed “QTS”.

Violence Against Women and Girls

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): Like most hon. Members, I want to focus on one aspect of violence against women and girls: female genital mutilation. I believe that our concern reflects that of the public, and that was brought home to me when I was asked to do several media interviews following the publication of our Committee’s report, because every one of them focused on concern about FGM in this country. I believe that once people become aware of the issue, they want resources allocated to address it. I welcome the prioritisation that DFID is giving FGM by providing £35 million towards the ambitious aspiration of ending it in a generation. I want to touch on the practice here and abroad, and to update Members on one or two statistics that have been published since the Committee published its report. I will finish by asking the Minister some questions.
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As we have heard, a terrifying number of girls are affected—140 million. According to UNICEF, 98% of women and girls in Somalia are affected. In Guinea, 96% are affected; in Egypt, 91%; in Eritrea, 89%; in Sierra Leone, 88%; in Ethiopia, 74%; in Sudan, 88%; in Gambia, 76%; and in Burkina Faso, 76%. The practice also occurs in many countries outside Africa, so it is a truly global problem. In recent decades, the practice has grown significantly among the migrant communities of north America, Scandinavia, Europe and the UK.
Our Committee was shocked to receive statistics for this country from the Department of Health. A 2007 report indicated that about 66,000 women and girls in the UK had undergone FGM and that more than 20,000 girls aged under 15 were at risk. However, those figures may well have been a gross underestimate. I had the privilege of sponsoring the launch in the House this week of a report from the New Culture Forum. That report extrapolated figures from the 2011 census data, whereas the figures that I cited were from the 2001 census. The number of women and girls living with FGM from migrant communities is highly likely to have increased over those years. It is now estimated that the figures could be about three times those that the Committee received, meaning that about 170,000 could have undergone FGM, and about 65,000 girls aged 13 and under could be at risk of mutilation.
The New Culture Forum report also includes thought-provoking comments, one of which is the frequently made statement that it is now almost 30 years since legislation was enacted to outlaw the practice—the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985—yet

“not a single successful prosecution has been brought against FGM practitioners.”

It is interesting to note that we are behind Kenya in that respect, as it has brought at least three successful prosecutions. As has been mentioned, France has brought many more. However, it is not only 30 years since legislation prohibiting the practice was enacted, because legislation relevant to it actually goes back as far as 1861, as what is happening is grievous bodily harm. It is child sexual abuse of the worst possible nature, so we really must do all that we can to break down what the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has called a “wall of silence” that is inhibiting prosecutions in this country.
We need to ensure that professionals in the field, including criminal prosecutors and health care practitioners, receive adequate training, and that there is engagement and education within FGM-practising communities. As many Members have said, FGM is a cultural practice that has to be changed.
There is a difficultly with compiling evidence. Only this week, we heard that hospitals are failing to report FGM as they should, because

“161 hospitals that responded to a Freedom of Information request, 83 said that they did not formally record FGM cases.”

That has to change. This week we heard that the chief inspector of constabulary, Tom Winsor, was reported as saying:

“Police are never called by certain minority communities because they administer their own justice even in cases as serious as…sexual assaults on children.”

That also has to change.
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The most important factor in inhibiting action is excessive cultural sensitivity, which is simply a reluctance to combat the practice of FGM for fear of appearing reactionary or prejudiced. The profound irony is that that perspective generates a discrimination of its own as the victims remain unprotected precisely because of their race. It is interesting that the Council of Europe has clearly dismissed arguments of political correctness, stating:

“It is a matter of urgency to make a distinction between the need to tolerate and protect minority cultures and turning a blind eye to customs that amount to torture and inhuman or barbaric treatment”

of this type.
As a French lawyer said at the event that I was privileged to sponsor this week, “You cannot use the excuse, ‘It’s their culture.’ Torture is not culture.”
In most cases, parents and/or grandparents—the very people a child would expect to provide them with protection—are present at the act, and it is often conducted at their instigation. It is heart-rending to hear some of the recordings of a child crying out, “Mummy, Mummy” during the act. This is not only about all the physical damage that we have heard of today, as the psychological and mental damage that the children—they are often aged between six and 12—suffer cannot be calculated.
I turn to several questions to which I would like the Minister to respond. First, although our Committee welcomes DFID’s announcement of £35 million for a programme to end FGM in a generation, if that aspiration is to be met, the funding needs to be invested sensitively and carefully. I remind the Minister of the Committee’s recommendation of adopting a “phased and flexible” approach to ensure that evidence-based programming is conducted. Will she update us on progress with regard to the use of that £35 million to tackle FGM worldwide?
Secondly, will the Minister confirm reports of how the Metropolitan police are approaching the issue? I understand that they have reopened some FGM cases. How confident is the Minister that that will lead to a prosecution in this country? It is clear that we need to put aside political correctness and adopt a far more robust, cross-agency approach in which the police proactively track girls at risk. Our Committee has recommended the publication of an up-to-date, binding document requiring all health service providers, the Department of Health, the Department for Education, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Home Office, the Government Equalities Office, the police, the Ministry of Justice and the Crown Prosecution Service to play their part. Will she look again at that? Is it not the case that unless we have joined-up working, we will not be able to tackle FGM in this country? Even more so, unless we have international joined-up working, and learn from good practice and success in other countries, we will not achieve our global aspiration. This massive challenge requires joint working by as many agencies as possible.
The Committee noted that the Government disagreed with our report’s recommendation that a cross-Whitehall strategy for tackling FGM should be published, as they said that they already had an action plan in place. Why, as the Prime Minister himself admitted earlier this month, do we therefore still lack results on stamping
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out this practice in the UK? During our inquiry, we discovered that there was no consistent data collection on FGM in the NHS. Will the Minister assure us that the Government will start collecting information routinely about at-risk babies and girls, and that that information will be used to take action?
We welcome the action already taken by DFID and its financial commitment. However, we highlight in particular that although robust action must be taken, it needs to be culturally applicable and there has to be joint working, both within and outside the UK.

Strengthening Couple Relationships

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth) on securing this important debate.
I speak from the perspective that supporting stronger relationships is a public health issue. The importance of relationships in preventing disease and in prolonging life, health and well-being is becoming increasingly recognised, not only for partners in a relationship, but for their children, their wider family and the community at large.
The scale of the problem of relationship breakdown is such that we cannot put it into the “too difficult” category. Government have to act and treat it as a public health issue. The public health outcomes framework should make explicit mention of family and relationship factors. In particular, we need to be concerned about
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the impact of family breakdown on those in the more deprived households. Relationship breakdown affects them more than others, and the outcome for the children can be disproportionately serious.
According to a recent YouGov survey for the Prince’s Trust of 2,161 young people aged 16 to 25, 21% of the children in poor homes said that no one had ever told them, “I love you.” Those results show that young people from deprived homes where there are not necessarily functioning and strong relationship standards are significantly more likely to face symptoms of mental illness, including suicidal thoughts, feelings of self-loathing and panic attacks. Young people who grow up in poverty are also twice as likely to believe that no one cares about them—22% expressed such a view compared with a figure of 10% for the wider youth population. The tragedy is that many young people are growing up today in households where they have no role models for strong relationships.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP): My constituency of Belfast North, which is one of the most deprived in the United Kingdom, bears testimony to what the hon. Lady is saying. Great work is being done by local groups on relationship support, but does she agree that part of this issue is the need to take away the stigma attached to going for help about relationships? There needs to be more education to ensure that people feel comfortable about coming forward.
Fiona Bruce: I agree entirely and hope to come on to that issue.
Professor Scott Stanley has talked about the perfect storm that is brewing with

“an ever greater amount of family instability”

and has said that for young people the problems are going to be pronounced. He says:

“Attachment is an unalterable, important human need and reality, and how attachment systems form in individuals really matters”

for their future health and well-being. He also argues that:

“The cultural systems and structures that always have helped couples clarify, form, and maintain strong commitments have been steadily eroding”—

most notably, the sense that marriage and childbearing inherently belong together, which makes ongoing stability more likely than not.
The nature and extent of the problem we are up against have all the hallmarks of a public health emergency. The Office for National Statistics recently found that people’s personal relationships, mental health and overall sense of well-being are all intimately bound up with each other. But the stakes are even higher than that: in many cases it is about life and death. A huge review of 148 studies, with almost one third of a million participants, that looked at how social relationships influence the risk of mortality showed that people with stronger social relationships have an incredible 50% increased likelihood of survival when compared with those with poor or insufficient social relationships.
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I want to give credit to Dr Samantha Callan of the Centre for Social Justice for drawing many of these issues to my attention. She argues that the influence of social relationships on risk of mortality is comparable with risk factors such as smoking, and exceeds many well-known risk factors such as obesity and physical inactivity.
Other potential public health issues are isolation and loneliness. The absence of loving relationships of any sort is bad for health and is linked with increased risk of cardio-vascular disease, diabetes, stroke, obesity and death. One of my constituents has written to me to say that it is absolutely critical that the new health and wellbeing boards take into account the issue of loneliness and focus on how they can improve relationship support, bearing in mind the impact that loneliness is having on our older generation.
Studies on the impact of relationship difficulties suggest that improving couple relationships has the potential to reduce alcohol misuse. Recent studies focusing on metabolic syndrome suggest that obesity, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and poor blood sugar metabolism, all of which increase the risk of heart disease, diabetes and stroke, are other mechanisms by which poor marital adjustment increases poor health outcomes for women.
There is also the issue of obesity among children. Children who are raised by parents who have what is called an authoritative—not an authoritarian—parenting style apparently eat more healthily, are more physically active and have a lower body mass index than children raised under other parenting styles, such as authoritarian, permissive, indulgent, uninvolved or neglectful. Reports say that marital dissatisfaction results in more authoritarian and less authoritative parenting. In other words, there is a vicious cycle. The quality of the parental relationship has a significant bearing on children’s health. The sad fact is that disadvantaged children suffer the most.
If a focus on relationships has the potential to deliver significant public health gains, how do we realise those gains? Certainly, building stronger relationships requires encouraging couples to build on good habits and to reduce bad ones. We should encourage and support proposals within plans such as the “Let’s Stick Together” programme developed by Care for the Family, which talks about avoiding negative habits. Often the issue is skills, which can be developed. Such skills include being responsive or even enthusiastic about what a partner is saying, expressing feelings of warmth and affection, managing conflict, communicating well and preserving a friendship, as well as learning how to perceive and demonstrate commitment and deal constructively with misunderstandings. All those skills can be learnt, and learning them is critical when people have had no role models.
We also need preventive relationship education, web-based support and specialist counselling and therapeutic services—prevention rather than cure. Could we not move some of the millions of pounds that Relate receives to work at the outset of relationships instead of using the money to deal with the fallout and damage at the end?
The CEO of the Fatherhood Institute, Adrienne Burgess, has said:

“Encouraging parents to both take a lot of responsibility for looking after the child…and earning is a great way to help couples become real team parents. When they do this child rearing brings them together and means they are less likely to split up.”

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On maternity services, Adrienne Burgess has argued:

“Increasing the potential for both of them to be involved is a really simple way to help strengthen couple relationships.”

To return to my point about the elderly, loneliness has significant links to a range of chronic conditions, including high blood pressure and depression, and increases the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease by over 60%. On average, 10% of the population aged over 65 is chronically lonely, which means that they feel lonely all or most of the time. It is vital that the health implications of this issue are recognised by those making decisions about local health priorities. The proportion of elderly people in our population is increasing. Many of them live alone due to relationship breakdown. Helping them to sustain partner relationships, with the mutual support that such relationships can provide in later life, could carry major personal and public health benefits.
The Relationships Foundation has described strong relationships as a national asset that we should preserve and strengthen. The social capital of families and communities is a sustainable bedrock not only of our national wealth but of our well-being. Stronger relationships between couples mean that those couples can then provide strength and support up and down generations, across families and out into communities. That is a national resource that we must nurture and cultivate, and that we ignore at our peril.

Fixed Odds Betting Terminals

Debate

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8 Jan 2014 : Column 403
Several Members have asserted that there has been an uncontrollable, unsustainable boom in gambling, but a study of the facts simply does not support that. There was an increase in the use of FOBTs after the Gambling Act 2005 was introduced, but the number of them on the high street has declined in the past three years. Betting shops are changing location, but there has been no explosion in their total number. Some Members have cited the gambling prevalence survey, which they say shows a 50% increase in problem gambling, but that increase is from 0.6% to 0.9% in problem gambling, according to surveys taken between 2007 and 2010. The change in numbers in those two studies are within the margin of error, so not necessarily statistically significant, and other studies since 2010 have demonstrated that instances of problem gambling are declining. That is why we must have a sensible evidence-based approach.
The scenario that the Labour party paints about gambling on the high street, the prevalence of FOBTs, and the clustering of betting shops, was created entirely by the 2005 Act. Was the decision of the then Labour Government based on robust evidence and science? No. The Act perhaps had good intentions, but it has had massive unintended consequences. When Richard Caborn gave evidence to the Select Committee, he was asked why the previous Government settled on having four FOBTs in betting shops—what was the reason for that number? He responded:

“There was no magic, scientific arrangement for four, I can honestly assure you. It was an agreement saying what was reasonable and what we believed—with the evidence that we had—was proportionate at the time. That is exactly how it happened.”

It was their best guess, and it has led to the clustering of FOBTs on the high streets. Because there is demand for FOBTs and not enough premises to play them in, bookmakers have opened new betting shops so they can have new terminals.
I was interested in the shadow Minister’s response to my earlier intervention when I said that, on face value, the wording of the Labour motion suggested that local authorities could retrospectively change the number of terminals in a shop, but only downwards. I think that refutes the idea that the motion is localist or about giving powers to local communities in any way. If it was, it might do what the Select Committee recommended and give local authorities the power to say, “Perhaps we will have more terminals in fewer shops, and fewer shops on the high street” and have the power to make that decision. This is not a localist motion but one in which the Labour party is asking councils to do what it wants—close betting shops and get rid of FOBTs altogether.

6.28 pm

Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab): In the little time available I will restrict my remarks to the impact of FOBTs on increased criminality and money laundering on our high streets. We might criticise the Gambling Act 2005, but it clearly states that gambling machines must prevent

“gambling from being the being a source of crime and disorder, being associated with crime and disorder, or being used to support crime”,

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yet that is exactly what is happening on our streets. These machines are being used to launder millions of pounds of money from criminality, drug dealing, loan sharking, people trafficking and so on.
There is a particularly nasty crime family in my constituency, and the Home Secretary has spoken on numerous occasions about the good work that County Durham has done to tackle organised crime. That crime family in my constituency has been moved on from “cash for crash”, drug dealing and so on, but where are they now? They are all over these FOBT machines. The Remote Gambling Association admitted in September that FOBTs represent a

“high inherent money laundering risk”.

The European Union is likely to include the machines in directive 4 on money laundering, and I would be interested to hear what the Minister thinks about that. Even the United Nations office on drugs and crime has warned that these games are used by organised crime to launder cash. The EU, the UN and even the Government recognise how dangerous this is. Despite the assertion from the gambling industry and the Association of British Bookmakers that they fully comply with the law, it is clear that, however inadvertently, these machines are now an integral and increasing part of the machinery of organised crime and money laundering. In the little time I have left, I plead with the Government to take seriously, in their review, the impact of FOBTs on money laundering and their increasing use, and to limit the stake.

6.30 pm

Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con): This is a serious issue, one that I have campaigned on locally and spoken on in this House. I hope the shadow Minister will look at my previous contributions before we go on local radio tomorrow morning and he will see what I have said on this issue in the past.
I will not be supporting the Labour motion this evening. I will be supporting the Government’s amendment, because a lot of progress is being made. The tone of the debate—that the proliferation in our high streets is the Government’s fault—is a bit rich when Labour’s 2005 Act, which liberalised much of the regulations and legislation, has caused the problem we are all now concerned about.
I share the concerns of many Members on both sides of the House about the impact that FOBTs are having on our constituents, but it is wrong and misguided for Opposition Members to say that the issue is applicable only to those in deprived areas. I represent a constituency with areas of multiple deprivation. The figures for the amount being gambled in FOBTs in those areas are the same as those for the amount being gambled in the much more affluent areas of Kent, such as Sevenoaks and Tunbridge Wells, so it is difficult to say that this issue is confined to more deprived areas.
It is important to consider the evidence, collect all the necessary data and ensure that we respond accordingly. My only concern, if I were to have one criticism of the Government’s policy, is that that should be done more quickly. Having an interim report early next year and a report later in the autumn will not be quick enough to deal with the issue, because it is an increasing problem. I am not opposed to giving councils more flexibility to
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deal with clustering, but the problem is not exclusive to bookmakers. As a consequence of previous legislation, it is also the case with payday loan companies, pawnbrokers and licensed premises.
We do not necessarily need legislation to deal with this problem. Conservative-led Medway council has been working with other organisations and has implemented a voluntary code of conduct with the ABB to try to ensure that we deal with problem gambling directly. That is a much more sensible way forward and I look forward to seeing the outcomes of that partnership.

6.33 pm

Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op): It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch). She took part in an Adjournment debate I secured in April on this subject, and she agreed that we should give local authorities the opportunity to provide part of the solution. I understand that she will not be voting for the motion, but the Government should listen to the spirit of what she has said, particularly on the rapidity of the research—that was a point well made.
You can get odds of 66:1 on Fulham winning the FA cup this season, Mr Speaker. I had my usual annual bet before the third round. Both Fulham and Norwich tried to lose, but we are still in the cup. I mention that to make the point to the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) that not everybody who has concerns about FOBTs is anti-gambling or views it as anathema.
The Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles) has indicated from a sedentary position several times during the course of the debate that the number of FOBT machines has gone down, but that is not the case in my constituency. The point of the motion and the debate is about those areas where the number of machines and betting shops is increasing. I invite him to come with me to Cambuslang main street, in my constituency, a small main street that now has five betting shops, each with four machines, within 200 yards of each other. Before my Adjournment debate last April, I visited several betting shops in my constituency, and in Glasgow close to my constituency and in London, and each time I saw people on the machines for long periods putting in significant amounts—I could see that just by standing there. The Government must take cognisance of that, instead of just saying that the number of machines has fallen. This is a problem about proliferation, as my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) said at the start of the debate.
My interest in this subject arose in late 2011 when a constituent came to me having lost £25,000 in a single month on a machine in a betting shop in my constituency. It was no surprise to me that the betting shop was in one of the most deprived parts of my constituency. He came to me not because he thought he had a problem, but because he thought the machines were fixed. That underlines the point. I spent some time with Hamilton gamblers’ anonymous. Strikingly, several younger people in that group had accepted they had a problem, had gone for help and were trying to resolve their issues, but they had a problem relating to these machines. The situation was very different with the older people in that group. The Government ought to take that seriously.
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We have heard a lot about the staff in the shops. My hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Tom Blenkinsop) knows from his experience that people in those betting shops often feel under pressure not to report things. They have said very clearly that they want to be bookmakers, not bouncers, and that they find themselves intimidated into not reporting incidents. All these are important issues, but the proliferation and concentration of shops in particular areas is the big issue that the Government should address first.

6.36 pm

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): Some 400,000 people in this country are problem gamblers and 3.5 million are at risk of developing a gambling problem. These are not small numbers. Furthermore, 50% of problem gamblers reporting to the National Problem Gambling Clinic say that fixed odds betting terminals are a disproportionate cause of problem gambling. We can understand why that is when we hear that these high-stakes machines can take bets of £100 per game and that up to £1,800 can be lost in an hour. Every year in the UK, people lose more than £1 billion on FOBTs, of which problem gamblers lose £300,000.
Users do not need to be addicted for catastrophic problems to be caused to them and their families. It is not just an individual problem, but a grave social and public health issue that we need to recognise and deal with. Phill Holdsworth, head of external affairs at Christians Against Poverty, says:

“Where we work with families…where one member…has a problem with gambling it is very difficult and often impossible to provide any form of debt solution. It is not possible to put forward a solution without them receiving help or support for their addiction. This means the other family members”

continue to suffer. He continued:

“A debt solution is very difficult to apply when gambling problems are present.”

Problem gambling costs society £3.24 billion a year, and the addition of each problem gambler severely affects the lives of about eight individuals around them. As such, about 3 million people are now affected by problem gambling—every one an individual, every one a blighted life, many of them children. We urgently need a concerted Government approach and—I believe—a cross-party approach to address the economic, social and health costs associated with problem gambling. The Salvation Army, whose work I pay tribute to in this respect, says:

“Problem gambling particularly affects the young… Problem gambling amongst young people is an emerging public health issue. In the UK, over 10% of children who gamble are problem gamblers, whilst 18% of them are at risk gamblers.”

I agree with the phrase used by the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex), when he said that many people viewed gambling as anathema. I do. We need to review our whole approach towards gambling. The average treatment for a problem gambler costs £675, meaning that £274 million would be required to treat all problem gamblers in the UK, yet the gambling industry’s contribution is just £5 million.
Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con): I understand that the terminals generate about £300 million of tax revenue. Given my hon. Friend’s comments, has she considered the impact that Labour’s proposals might have on the Exchequer?
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Fiona Bruce: They might terminate that amount of revenue, but the gross gambling yield for the industry is £5.6 billion a year. I consider inadequate a contribution of £5 million to research, education and treatment activities related to gambling, which equates to less than 2% of their income. As I say, we need a wholesale review.
I oppose the Opposition motion, which is wholly inadequate, not least because the hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford), who introduced it, said that the motion was not about problem gambling. Well, it should be. I support the Government amendment, but I exhort the Minister to expedite the research and extend the Government’s work on the devastating causes and consequences of all problem gambling, not least for the sake of our next generation.