Dublin City Council Planning Illegal Gambling Advertisement Crackdown

Dublin City Council is looking to crack down on a legislative loophole that allows local retail betting shops to display illegal external gambling advertisements for the duration of many major sporting tournaments.

Current planning rules give properties in Ireland’s largest municipality up to four weeks to remove any advertising banners deemed illegal without penalty although this condition usually results in such proscribed signage remaining in windows and doorways for the full length of a competition.

Acute Ambiguity 

Fed up with retail betting shops exploiting this loophole, Dublin City Council has now advised its planning department to ‘go straight to legal action in respect of the next suitable case’ of a venue erecting illegal signage. 

Officials believe this will initiate a test court case to establish whether they may take ‘urgent action’ to remove such offending banners or if new legislation needs to be drafted to end the four-week provision. 

Local councillors have previously accused betting shop operators of often utilizing this grace period dodge to erect illicit advertising banners and ‘exploit’ vulnerable and ‘marginalised communities’ by encouraging them to wager on competitions including high-profile horseracing festivals and soccer matches. 

Dublin City Council anticipates its case will argue there is ‘significant urgency’ to address such ‘advertising gambling services’ practices by doing away with the current four-week window. 

Prime Protagonist 

Councillor Janet Horner proposed the initial crackdown motion and declared vulnerable people in Dublin are being cynically ‘exploited by completely moral-less gambling organizations’. 

The Green Party representative went on to describe such operators as ‘a scourge on inner city communities’ because they know they are ‘exploiting a planning loophole’ so as ‘to freely and illegally advertise outside their shops’. 

“Most recently for the Rugby World Cup there was advertising all over the front of the betting shops,” Horner told The Irish Times. 

“I put in the complaints, I’m sure other people put in the complaints, and they had four weeks to take it down, which happens to be to be the exact length of time of most established sports tournaments. The banner has done its job and done its damage in the time they have been given by the planning legislation to remove it.” 

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Significant Allies 

For his part, Labour Party councillor Declan Meenagh agreed with Horner and proclaimed this type of illicit advertising in Dublin is proving particularly difficult for problem gamblers to ignore. 

“These are massive big companies and they are making their money from the small percentage of people with gambling problems,” Meenagh said. “I think we should really crack down on it hard.” 

From the Fine Gael political party, councillor Ray McAdam asserted the hospitality industry in Dublin is often guilty of utilizing analogous tactics especially when it comes to large alcohol advertising banners. 

The experienced representative is now pushing for Dublin City Council to take ‘a zero-tolerance approach’ with regards to such practices ‘across whoever is doing it’.