UofG to lead independent gambling centre
The University of Glasgow will lead the UK’s largest independent gambling harms research centre, together with the Universities of Sheffield, Swansea and King’s College London.
The centre, a UKRI investment funded through the government's Gambling Levy, will direct world-leading research on how to tackle and prevent gambling harms.
The Gambling Harms Research UK (GHR-UK) Evidence Centre, a UKRI investment funded through the government's Gambling Levy, will direct world-leading research on how to tackle and prevent gambling harms.
Harmful gambling’s burden on the UK economy is conservatively estimated at around £1.4 billion per year, impacting the healthcare and criminal justice systems as well as generating individual impacts such as depression and suicide.
A lack of high quality independent evidence on gambling-related harms is a major barrier to effective policy, prevention, and treatment.
The new centre will work with government, health bodies, charities, people with lived experience of gambling and the wider research community to generate and apply independent, evidence led research. This will strengthen policy, practice, and public understanding across the UK.
The centre will manage a comprehensive and innovative research programme on gambling harms, build capacity in gambling harms research and collaborate with stakeholders.
It will also explore how UKRI and other data assets can support generating new evidence and coordinate the cohort of GHR-UK Innovation Partnerships.
The centre is led by Heather Wardle, Professor of Gambling Research & Policy at the University of Glasgow, with partners at King’s College London, University of Sheffield and Swansea University. "We’re proud to lead UKRI’s first ever Gambling Harms Research Evidence Centre. For too long, gambling research has been under-resourced and overlooked. New funding through the Levy and UKRI marks a vital reset—strengthening the quality and scale of gambling harms research and ensuring policy is driven by rigorous, independent evidence.
"Putting lived experience at the heart of our work, we look forward to collaborating widely to deepen understanding of - and reduce - the serious harms associated with gambling."