Risk for me is an occupational hazard. Why would I film myself running through a front line in eastern Ukraine to a soundtrack of roaring shells and my own cardio-averse panting? (Hint: it’s not the money, trust me.) What would …
America has been hustled
“When you hustle you keep score real simple. The end of the game you count up your money. That’s how you find out who’s best. That’s the only way.” The lines come from The Hustler (1961) starring Paul Newman, George …
Why all MPs are gamblers
“Are you two really the best we’ve got to be the next prime minister of our great country?”, asked Robert, during the final election leadership debate. As a Question Time audience intervention, it was a classic of the genre: knowing, …
Westminster’s gambling addiction
When, in the autumn of 1963, Harold Macmillan resigned as Prime Minister, there was no formal mechanism in place for deciding who his replacement would be. Back then, the Conservative Party still prided itself in a self-selecting process — what …
Sports betting is worse than Oxycontin
In the small hours of the morning, while most people are asleep, my cousin bets on Indian Premier League cricket. In the afternoon, he bets on the Rugby League. His evenings are consumed with the popular American sports — basketball, …
Keir Starmer’s gambling problem
When Tony Blair’s government liberalised gambling, smartphones were still the stuff of science fiction. Sir Alan Budd, who wrote the 2001 review that the 2005 Gambling Act was based on, recently conceded in a House of Lords inquiry that “no …