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.
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 Gambling Harms Research UK (GHR-UK) Evidence 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, led by the Universities of Glasgow, Sheffield, Swansea and King’s College London, will:
- manage a comprehensive and innovative research programme on gambling harms
- build capacity in gambling harms research
- collaborate with stakeholders
- explore how UKRI and other data assets can support generating new evidence
- coordinate the cohort of GHR-UK Innovation Partnerships
Research, treatment and prevention
The Gambling Levy is split across three strands:
- Treatment
- Prevention
- Research
UKRI and the Gambling Commission are responsible for investing 20% of the Gambling Levy funds in research, which amounts to £22.1 million for 2025-26. To date, this includes 32 rapid evidence reviews, the new Centre, 19 new Innovation Partnerships and four UKRI policy fellows.
Arts and Humanities Council executive chair Christopher Smith said: “Gambling harms can have devastating consequences for individuals, families and communities. This new independent Evidence Centre is a major step in building the high-quality research base needed to inform better policy, prevention and treatment across the UK.
“Through the Gambling Levy, UKRI is helping to establish a long-term, credible and independent research capability on gambling harms, grounded in research integrity and public value.”
The GHR-UK Evidence Centre is a major part of the Research Programme on Gambling, delivered by UKRI. Further investments will be made in the future, including research on the convergence between gambling and video gaming.
The Evidence Centre and the wider GHR-UK network it supports, will draw on the knowledge and experience of people with lived and living experience of gambling harms, alongside wider communities affected by gambling. This approach ensures that research will not sit in isolation but will actively shape prevention and treatment initiatives funded through the levy.
The GHR-UK Evidence Centre will build upon extensive existing research and be primed to work with policy partners, health agencies and charities, to strengthen understanding of gambling harms and how to prevent them as quickly as possible.
It will also train a new generation of leaders in gambling research who can deliver science of the highest quality across a wide range of disciplinary areas.
The GHR-UK Evidence Centre is led by Heather Wardle, Professor of Gambling Research and Policy at the University of Glasgow, with partners at King’s College London, University of Sheffield and Swansea University.
Wardle said: “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.”
Real harms
People who have experienced gambling related harms and their families are central to the work of the GHR-UK Evidence Centre. The project team are committed to involving people with lived and living experience of gambling in the co-design of the centre’s programme of work.
This is why the GHR-UK Evidence Centre have appointed Martin Jones as a lived experience lead.
Martin has deep personal insight into the real-world harms of addictive gambling products, having directly experienced the devastating impact of gambling-related suicide.
Martin has since been involved with a wide range of research, education and treatment organisations and charities, and brings a broad perspective to this role. He knows how important it is that research engages meaningfully with those harmed.
Martin said: "Research isn't an intellectual exercise sitting in isolation, it is and should be closely linked to real gambling harms affecting real people, as many of us know all too well. We need to do much more to prevent these harms, and coordinating top quality research will support this, especially by exploring the more complex areas around suicide, algorithms, and financial data."
Partnerships
One of the Centre’s main roles will be to coordinate the cohort of 19 GHR-UK Innovation Partnerships covering a broad range of topics, including:
- gambling harms and sport
- gambling online and in videogames
- the structural drivers of gambling harm
Based at universities across the UK, the Innovation Partnerships will carry out research to fill gaps in the evidence base and support the development of responses to gambling-related harms.
Together, the Evidence Centre and Innovation Partnerships form the GHR-UK network, working closely to generate evidence, build research capacity, and inform policy and practice across the UK, while training the next generation of gambling harms researchers.
Independence
Independence from commercial gambling interests is fundamental to the work of the Centre.
A strong governance and integrity framework safeguards this autonomy, ensuring the Centre operates without external influence and remains a credible and trusted source of research on gambling harms.
As the UK’s first research Centre on gambling harms that is free from industry involvement, the Centre’s independence guarantees that the evidence produced by GHR‑UK remains protected from external commercial interference.