The proposal for clubs to allow Salvation Army Officers to counsel gamblers on site at the poker machines is doomed to failure. If there was any chance of it succeeding, the clubs wouldn’t be going ahead with it.
The clubs make money out of the addicted gamblers and to say they want to help them is like saying they want to make less money, which of course is not true.
The Salvation Army are well-meaning people who see good in everyone, including apparently the representatives of the gaming industry with whom they made this deal and, as often happens to well-meaning people, they have been duped.
The clubs and pubs and the gaming industry remain as they always were – parasites and bloodsuckers feeding off other people’s misery.
Bob Vinnicombe
Sefton
