The Machine Zone is the name of our company. It’s a phrase taken from Las Vegas to describe the zone where machine players enter interacting with electronic gambling machines. Everything dissolves – worries, responsibilities, time itself. It is the zone of addiction. We believe that some products are designed to induce this zone.

It’s not just gambling. Most of us have probably found ourselves at some or a lot of the time ‘hooked’ to our digital devices, ‘in the zone’, maybe feeling calmer and escaping the demands of the day. So, now and then, on the Machine Zone website we post about this everyday digital immersion. It’s now accepted that for some people there is a risk of becoming ‘addicted’ to digital devices which brings deterioration of mental health. And, of course, our increasing familiarity with the digital environment and its charms may introduce us to ‘exciting’ games, and to gambling.

One of our central aims has been to raise awareness of digital harms, especially in relation to young people.

In many ways our focus on gambling represents one of the many areas of concern connected with online behaviours. In common with others we understand the risks as being health issues and locate them in the field of public health  approaches which examine the wider influences upon our behaviour such as advertising and the design of digital products which may lead to our engaging with them in unhealthy ways.

By drawing attention to any ills that may occur as the result of digital engagement as health issues we also seek to challenge stigma. Stigma blames an individual for their behaviour, marks them as deficient in some way, morally weak for instance. Identifying compulsive gambing, for instance, as a serious mental health disorder goes some way to remove stigma and draw attention to wider social, commercial and cultural factors in shaping ill health.

Gambling Watch Scotland is a website which publishes information about developments in Scotland. It puts this in the context of UK and international news.

Generally speaking, it’s the case that unlike south of the border there are few grassroots-led and driven enterprises which seek to raise awareness and push for gambling reforms. There are notable exceptions from individuals who are doing great work based on their lived experience. We’re inspired by them and all those burgeoning organisations beyond Scotland which have grown in recent years to involve more and more people with lived experience, to mutually support, to organise powerful voices towards policy change and advocacy.

The Scotland Reducing Gambling Harm program at the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland has done great work in recent years to extablish a forum of lived experience. It also continues to run events, grow networks, quietly and efficiently reach policy makers, and provide ourselves with tremendous support. Similarly, the Gambling Education Hub at Fast Forward, in addition to its great education work across Scotland, holds a range of events related to gambling harm. nourishes network growth and emphasises the importance of lived experience.

There has been a growth of activities from other third sector organisations. For instance COPE SCotland has been looking at gambling harms since 2007. In 2022 the Glasgow Council for the Voluntary Sector appointed a gambling harms worker. In statutory services, Scotland Public Health has been promoting attention to gambling harms for a decade, as has Glasgow City Council, these two staging the Glasgow Gambling Summit in 2021. Elswehere, from further afield from Orkney to Dumfries we see  initiatives to tackle gambling harms. There are also signs that gambling harms are receiving focused attention at national government level.

One Last Spin is, without doubt, our main achievement. It’s the film  Martin always wanted to make since back in 2017. He met with film maker Ross Donald from Reverie Films  in February 2020. Ross, who knew nothing about gambling, was enthralled by Martin’s story, so much so that he promised to make the fim without any financial remuneration. Enthusiastic pre-production discussions took place. The cameras were about to roll. Then Covid hit. Yet through two years of lockdown, raising funds for the production costs and searching locations, chosing actors and getting film crews together Ross and his team got the job done. Sponsors generously funded the making of it.

The film has four interviews with Martin, Kelly Field, Tony Franklin and John Myers who have all been severely harmed by gambling. Each story is supplemented by brief dramatic pieces. Aso contributing were Professor Gerda Reith from Glasgow University Gambling Research Group, Inverclyde MP Ronnie Cowan who’s Vice-Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Gambling Related Harm at Westminster, and William Griffiths who was Manager at Scotland Reducing Gambling Harm.

In February 2022 the film was premiered at the Centre for Contemporary Arts in Glasgow. Then it was entered into film festivals where it’s picked up awards. During 2022 the film has been shown in online events set up by our partners. The feedback from audiences testifies to its power. ‘Impactful’ is a common response. We have also screened the film at the Scottish Gambling Education Hub‘s conference in Edinburgh, and at HMP Barlinnie. In January 2023 we are schedued to show the film at a conference with the Simon Community, then at the Glasgow Women’s Centre, then at Greater Govanhill magazine.

We believe the film deserves and needs to be seen far and wide. Reaching possible places to screen it has not been straightforward, and without tremendous help from others distribution so far would have been less successful. We’d love to see its being shown anywhere. We have a little funding to help venues so if you are interested do get in touch. We’re particularly keen to get the film into community venues to help raise awareness and start conversations.

Glasgow City Gambling Harms is a project funded by the Glasgow Council for the Voluntary Sector which established a gambling harms fund. It runs between November 2022 and February 2023 and is focused upon Glasgow City. We’ve recently been introduced to other recipients of the fund and greatly look forward to working with them.

Our project includes a website. On this you will find an Overview of work in Glasgow over the past 15 years or so which addresses gambling harms. It’s designed to be an introduction to the field for people new to the area. The site also includes detailed Support resources, a section on Community and one on Families and Affected Others.

At the end of the project we shall publish a second Overview which will evaluate its successes and weaknesses, and updates developments across the city. It’s largely the case that Glasgow is important in countrywide developments since much of the work being done in the city concentrates upon common themes.

Our project will also involve screenings of our film One Last Spin.

A third strand of the project is to design and have printed materials to be sent to selected places. One of these materials is a pocket-sized Support handbook. Other materials are aimed at frontline workers and community practitioners. These will be targeted at venues such as health centres and GP surgeries and contain brief notes on awareness-raising and screening. The venues will be those located in areas of Glasgow deemed the most deprived (where gambling harms are, on average, three time higher than in the general polulation). We shall also write to selected community venues enclosing leafets and an invitation to mount a screening event for our film.

We anticipate that the website will continue after the project and we are inviting our partner agencies to contribute material describing their own work.