Ladbrokes, Gala Coral, Paddy Power and William Hill voluntarily sign up to industry watchdog

Four of Britain’s biggest bookmakers have announced they will introduce a series of voluntary measures aimed to address public concerns over gambling.

William Hill, Ladrbokes, Gala Coral and Paddy Power have all jointly agreed to a series of changes, which include banning TV adverts before 9pm and setting up an independent standards commissioner to hold the industry to account.

The firms have also committed to remove all adverts for touch-screen roulette machines from their window from October, while from January 2015 the four bookmakers will fund an educational advertising campaign on gambling-related problems.

The campaign will be funded through a new trade body, the Senet Group, which will be purposely established, following in the path of the drinks industry trade body, the Portman Group, which has committed to set voluntary standards on branding and advertising.

The initiative was welcome by exponents of the betting industry, who claimed the move signified a step in the right direction for an industry which continues to face regulatory challenges.

"The launch of the Senet Group sets a benchmark by which we and the betting industry can be judged," said William Hill chief executive James Henderson, while a spokesman for Ladbrokes said the new measures were "about striking the balance between a player's right to bet and the visibility of gambling on the high street and on TV.”

The initiative, however, was almost immediately criticised by campaigners against fixed odds betting terminals (FOBT), the technical name betting shop roulette machines are known by.

"The bookmakers are engaging in desperate conjuring tricks to protect their FOBT market monopoly and, put simply, this is just more smoke and mirrors,” said a spokesman for the Campaign for Fairer Gambling.

"If the Gambling Commission was fit for purpose there would not be the need for a watchdog. But for any such watchdog to have credibility it should be neither industry-run nor industry-funded."

Paddy Power shares were down 0.48% to 51.77p, while Ladbrokes shares fell 1.31% to 128.10p and William Hill shares dropped 1.30% to 341.80p at 12:59 on Monday.