Brent Council has declared a gambling harms emergency and launched a new strategy to tackle the issue across the borough, citing a visible concentration of betting shops and adult gaming centres in our most deprived communities.
The decision, made at a Council meeting on Monday 6 July 2026, aims to create a coordinated approach involving various council departments, including licensing, planning, public health, and schools. The council's declaration was informed by its Joint Strategic Needs Assessment, which identified the financial, health and social costs of gambling harm locally, including its links to debt, poor mental health, family breakdown, crime and inequality.
A motion passed by the council stated that gambling harm is a public health crisis and a community safety issue that must be confronted together. It highlighted the visible concentration of betting shops and adult gaming centres in deprived communities, noting that in some parts of the borough, it can feel easier to find a betting shop than a supermarket. Indeed, with 81 licensed gambling premises in Brent, it is easier to find a betting shop or adult gaming centre than a supermarket.
The new strategy will focus on understanding the scale of the problem in Brent, allocating resources to prevention and support, and ensuring that licensing, planning, public health, schools, debt advice, and resident services all work in unison. The meeting information does not specify a timeline for the launch of this strategy.
The council also resolved to welcome new Gambling Impact Assessment powers, urging the government to implement them swiftly. These powers would allow councils to introduce presumption against new premises licences in vulnerable areas.
The council currently lacks sufficient powers to effectively regulate gambling premises and advertising and challenge[s] the Gambling Commission's approach to local licensing, making clear that Brent believes communities and their elected representatives, not distant regulators or the courts, should have the strongest voice in deciding what venues are on their high streets.
Furthermore, Brent Council will write to major landowners in Wembley to reiterate its opposition to gambling advertising and the normalisation of gambling in public spaces. This initiative is part of a broader effort to address the issue in the borough.
The council committed to continuing its national campaign for a new Gambling Act that prioritises public health. Specific provisions Brent Council is advocating for include stronger local licensing powers,
the removal of the outdated aim to permit
duty, greater public health oversight,
and tougher enforcement.
The council stated that residents should not have to see their high streets permeated with gambling premises while councils have limited powers to act.
Councillor Jasbinder Bajwa, who moved the motion, said: Gambling harm is not something that happens in the distance. It shows up in casework, in debt, in families under pressure, in mental health, in community safety and in the quiet crisis that too many residents face behind closed doors.
The motion was passed unanimously, with councillors from all parties supporting the declaration and the launch of the new strategy. Brent has led a national campaign for gambling reform, working with over 40 councils, alongside Dawn Butler MP and Andy Burnham MP to call for a five-point plan for change.
This campaign was also informed by the Social Market Foundation report 'High Streets at Stake', which Brent Council sponsored and which highlighted the growth of adult gaming centres and the weakness of the current licensing framework.
