Steve Hoare

Flutter maintains laser focus on sustainable corporate governance

Flutter Entertainment is making significant progress towards achieving its 2030 sustainability goals, corporate leadership asserts.

Initially set out in its 2022 ‘Positive Impact Plan’, the strategy focuses on improving four key areas revolving around Flutter’s impact on the environment, employment conditions, community support, as well as player safety.

Measuring each initiative against the importance it bears to stakeholders and the overall impact on the business, Flutter’s latest report identified safer gambling as ‘very high’ on the agenda, alongside staff inclusion and wellbeing.

Meanwhile, community investment, anti-money laundering measures and reduction of carbon emissions were classified as ‘high’ priorities for Flutter’s governing board.

Play Well
One of the main pillars of the Positive Impact Plan is the Play Well approach, where Flutter promotes RG education, engagement and use of safety tools among players – with the end goal being 75% of its customers using these tools by the end of 2030.

Since the launch of the sustainability plan in 2022, the percentage of Flutter customers using a Play Well tool seems to be well on its way to meeting the end goal. In 2022, that number was 37.7%. This then rose to 39.7% in 2023, only to reach 44.5% in 2024.

Peter Jackon, Flutter CEO, said: “Flutter is committed to sustainable growth and setting the agenda for positive change. Something I am particularly proud of is how we are continuing to help our customers to Play Well.

“We invested $139m to support and promote safe play across our global operations and saw 44.5% of our active online customers use one or more Play Well tools.”

Lifting communities
Flutter’s social impact is also on track to achieve its 2030 goal of improving a total of 10m lives globally. This includes the collaboration with new and existing partners to empower communities through fundraising and donations.

In 2022, Flutter managed to help 430,000 people, while in 2023 that number was increased to 1.53 million. For 2024, the number of cumulative lives improved stood at 2.55 million, with a total of $16.4m donated just in that year alone.

Sue Albion, Group Director of Sustainability and Regulatory Affairs, concluded: “Our Positive Impact Plan is at the heart of our business and I’m extremely proud of the progress we achieved in 2024, which wouldn’t have been possible without the shared commitment and passion from our colleagues across the globe.”

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Dutch offshore plague continues despite Google oversight

Google asserts that it already has active anti-offshore gambling policies in the Netherlands in response to a motion filed by two Dutch politicians.

Mikal Tseggai, a member of the Dutch Labour Party, and Willem Koops, from the New Social Contract Party, requested a direct government intervention to restrict unlicensed operators from being shown to Dutch residents in Google searches.

“The House of Representatives heard the deliberation…requesting the government to include a ban on advertising and making gambling websites findable in search engines in the new gambling law, unless the Gambling Authority (Kansspelautoriteit) has exceptionally certified a provider as a reliable organisation, the so-called whitelisting, on the basis of a careful review.”

In other words, the motion essentially asked for Google to refrain from giving advertising space to gambling operators unless the same ones have been explicitly cleared by the Kansspelautoriteit through the granting of a Dutch licence.

However, in an official response to CasinoNieuws.nl, Google confirmed that such measures already exist in the form of a whitelist incorporated within the US technology giant’s very own advertising policy.

This obliges the tech firm to only give region-specific advertising space to firms officially licensed by the relevant gambling regulators, including the Netherlands’ KSA.

Similar measures were most recently rolled out by Google across Nigeria and Germany.

Persistent issue
Despite this, illegal websites keep finding new ways to abuse Google’s search results to find new potential customers. In 2023, the tech firm reported a total of 5.5 billion ads taken down from its engine globally as they displayed content that violates its guidelines, including unlicensed gambling ads.

Earlier this year, Google’s EU headquarters in Ireland were contacted by the Dutch Quality Mark Responsible Affiliates (KVA) organisation that highlighted an increasing number of domains popping out after putting the term “casino without Cruks” in the search engine.

Dutch traffic towards such domains remains high, with the KVA reporting more than one million Dutch users lost to the black market by March of this year.

The development comes amid continuing political pressure on the Dutch gaming industry as the government looks at potential amendments to the 2021 Remote Gaming Act (KOA Act).

This review has been spearheaded by the State Secretary for Legal Protection, Teun Struycken, while proposed amendments have been subject to extensive parliamentary debate.

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Black market users reveal disdain for regulated operators

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AGA launches new messaging programme around positive play

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