The English Gambling Education Hub has published an insights report following its first networking event covering the topic, “how effective is collaboration around young people and gambling harms?”.
The EGEH is a partnership between seven organisations funded by GambleAware – GamCare, Aquarius, ARA – Recovery for All, Beacon Counselling Trust, Breakeven, NECA and Ygam – brought together to prevent gambling-related harm in young people.
At the EGEH’s first event back in March, nearly 100 professionals across education, health, voluntary and local authority sectors attended, including experts in mental health, suicide prevention, youth work, and those offering training, support, and treatment for gambling-related harms.
Introducing the Hub at the event, the topics explored were “the main barriers faced in competing for funding in the voluntary sector”, “the lack of time and resources to connect with each other fully”, and “the appetite for organisations across sectors to share learning, expand their reach and improve outcomes for young people”.
Within the first insights report, four key themes were identified at the event:
- Collaboration with young people to ensure designed initiatives achieve intended impacts.
- Identifying cross-sector links between gambling harm and other risky behaviours and issues.
- Sharing of work and resources between organisations to better serve young people.
- Consideration of diverse communities; who they are, where they are and how to connect with them to collaborate.
The EGEH also stated that the voice of young people would be included in their discussions via the GamCare Youth Advisory Board to make sure the Hub stays “relevant and ahead of the issues affecting young people”.
Several barriers and enablers to collaboration were identified at the event, which included gambling as a ‘hidden harm’, a lack of resources, and those resources not being relevant or accessible to all.
To address gambling being a hidden harm, enablers that were highlighted included providing free training to upskill, signposting to additional resources, education on topics such as early intervention, expert input, relationship building and publications for the latest insights.
Enablers to help address a lack of resources include a ‘one vision’ approach amongst organisations, tailored collaboration, open and honest dialogue, and easy access to resources and activities.
Addressing the barrier of not being relevant or accessible to all, the EGEH suggests the following enablers: knowledge of what’s available and gaps to fill, good practice shared across sectors, including the voice of young people, up-to-date information, and the consideration of diverse communities.
Youth Facing Professionals put forward four recommendations for the EGEH to take action on:
- Exploring ways to create collaborative partnerships to expand reach and combine messaging.
- Consulting with young people to enhance and improve offers for them.
- Exploring which communities and young people are not being reached and why.
- Exploring ways to connect with those communities.
Professional aspirations for the EGEH also included working to raise the profile of ‘hidden harm’, providing accessible gambling education for all, and professionals having access to the resources and services they need.
The EGEH’s full report on the effectiveness of collaboration around young people and gambling harms can be found here.
Recently, the Hub also held its second event, which explored the topic “Is traditional awareness raising appropriate for today’s young people?”. Insights from this event will be shared by the EGEH soon.
Earlier this week, GamCare published a report on how to improve bank gambling blocks across the customer journey.
