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The court battle between billionaire Richard Desmond and the UKGC will begin this week to decide the license to run the National Lottery.
Northern & Shell and The New Lottery Company (TNLC), owned by Desmond, is suing the UK Gambling Commission for up to £1.3 billion in a battle over the license to run the National Lottery. The company claims that there were “manifest errors” in the process of deciding who runs the lottery.
This comes after Allwyn won the 10-year license to run the game in 2022, with its leadership beginning in 2024. Since then, Desmond has launched a series of legal challenges claiming that the bid competition itself was flawed (with the result pre-determined), and that Allwyn should have been disqualified because it breached strict rules to do with briefing the media during the process. The allegations also highlight that the commission was adjusted in the contract after Allwyn had been chosen, which Desmond’s team means should have initiated a rerun.
The claim is based on EU law and also highlights alleged conflicts of interest that affected the UKGC’s impartiality in making the decision. Desmond’s lawyers assert that Northern & Shell and TNLC wasted £17.5 million on the bid process to no avail, as well as losing out on up to £1.3 billion due to the commission changes.
Impact on the National Lottery
Any payout won from the legal battle would be a significant loss to the charities involved with the National Lottery, as the sum would need to be paid from the pot to fund charitable pursuits. In fact, the Guardian reports that if the payout is larger than the fund (which receives roughly £30 million a week from lottery sales), the cost would be passed onto the taxpayer.
Desmond has already rejected a settlement offer from the UKGC, thought to have been worth around £10 million.

Featured image: Flickr, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

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The Arizona Department of Gaming has announced that the first quarter of the financial year has seen over $46 million in tribal gaming contributions.
In total, so far in the first quarter of the 2025/26 fiscal year, tribal gaming contributions to the Arizona Benefits Fund have amounted to $46,228,784. When broken down to different funds or sectors, $23,040,426 goes to the Instructional Improvement Fund and education, $11,520,213 goes to the Trauma and Emergency Services Fund, $4,160,591 to the Arizona Department of Gaming Operating Costs, $3,291,489 to the Arizona Wildlife Conservation Fund, $3,291,489 to the Tourism Fund, and $924,576 to fund Problem Gambling Education, Treatment and Prevention.
A growing fund in Arizona
When compared to the same quarter from the year before, those contributions have risen by around 5%. 88% of funds go to the Arizona Benefits Fund, before being split across the different funds listed above.
“As we close out the first quarter of Fiscal Year 2026, we are pleased to recognize another year of steady and responsible growth within Arizona’s tribal gaming industry,” said Jackie Johnson, Director of the ADG. “This sustained success is a direct testament to the strength of our coregulation and collaboration with our tribal partners. By actively working together, we ensure we achieve our mutual interests: protecting the integrity of gaming across the state, while consistently ensuring that regulated, legal gaming provides vital support for our Arizona communities.”
The remaining 12% of the income from the contributions is distributed by the tribes to the cities, towns, and counties of their choosing for a variety of programs, such as community services and public safety initiatives for local governments. Since the financial year of 2004, tribal contributions have totaled approximately $2.5 billion.
Tribal casinos are not the only gaming institutions to embed social responsibility in their financial plans, with the proposals vying for casino space in New York also including contributions to local groups and initiatives in their business plans.
Featured image: Flickr, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
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The UK Gambling Commission has published the 2024 Gambling Survey for Great Britain, which shows that nearly half of British adults gamble.
The survey collects data for the world’s largest dedicated study of gambling participation, behaviors, and consequences. Produced by the National Centre for Social Research and the University of Glasgow, the survey has gathered several findings, including that 48% of adults in Great Britain had gambled in the last four weeks.
That number falls to just 28% when you exclude those who only bought lottery tickets. Of that number, who gambled at all, 42% rated their last experience as a positive one, while 21% rated it negatively.
When it comes to gambling motivations, the vast majority (85%) said they were after a big financial win, while 72% put it down to gambling being fun. In 2024, the survey states that 2.7% of adults scored eight or more on the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI), a level described as “statistically stable” when compared to 2023.
Wider trends found in the survey
The Gambling Commission has used the data from the survey to publish two further reports. The first highlights risk profiles of regular gamblers who play on a weekly basis, while the second builds on previous understandings of the potential negative consequences of gambling.
“The Gambling Survey for Great Britain is a key building block of the evidence base which helps government, industry and other partners understand both gambling behaviour and potential consequences from gambling,” said Andrew Rhodes, Chief Executive of the Gambling Commission. “This year’s findings deepen our understanding of consequences from gambling and provide crucial insight into risk profiles among those who gamble most frequently. We strongly encourage operators to use this evidence to consider the risks within their own customer bases.”
In terms of actionable moves, Rhodes went on to highlight that learnings from the study led the Commission to introduce light-touch financial vulnerability checks on those spending £150 a month, reduce the intensity of online games by banning autoplay and slowing game speed, and tighten age verification in premises.
“We’ve also banned potentially harmful marketing offers involving consumers having to carry out two or more types of gambling, such as betting and playing slots, and limited the number of times bonus funds must be re-staked before a consumer can withdraw winnings,” he explained. “From the end of October, our new rules will give consumer controls over deposit limits and all gambling businesses must prompt their customers to set a financial limit before they make their first deposit.”
Other measures include setting limits on time and spending in land-based casinos, as well as introducing safer gambling messaging on machines.
Featured image: Unsplash
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