A hundred years after the first mention of bingo, as ‘housey housey’, research carried out at Kent warns safeguards are needed to protect its future.
Already the game and its distinctive environment, as a social and community experience, are threatened by automated variants of bingo, and the revenue earned from slot machines.
The findings of The Bingo Project’s three years of research will be presented at a conference entitled All Bets are Off conference: Reflecting Critically on Gambling Regulation Within and Across Borders being held at the University’s Canterbury campus on Thursday 23 and Friday 24 June 2016.
Kent Law School Reader in Law Dr Kate Bedford, who led the research, has a personal understanding of bingo as a social game played mostly by working class women, having been introduced to it as a child.
With no definition of bingo under the UK’s 2005 Gambling Act, Dr Bedford says that it is vital for the future of this so called ‘harmless form of gambling’ to be protected. She argues that regulation could protect the future of the game and see bingo return to popularity.
The Bingo Project was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and used case studies of bingo in England and Wales, Canada, Brazil, and online in the European Union.
Bingo was chosen because it is a globally significant, but under-studied, form of gambling. It is also associated with charitable fundraising as much as commercial gambling in many places.
Charities, religious organisations, and non-profit groups often operate the gaming themselves, making bingo a key example of the intersection between playful speculation and good works.
The conference makes substantive recommendations for those involved in bingo regulation including legalising bingo in Brazil and focussing European Union discussions on consumer protection in online gambling.