An advert for betting company Paddy Power has been banned for encouraging repeat gambling by showing it puts family first.
The ad shows a woman asking her boyfriend, “Do you think I’ll end up looking like my mother?”.
He, distracted by a gambling app, replies, “I hope so.”
Paddy Power said it accepts the advertising regulator’s decision and will take into account the guidance it has been given.
The advert aired on television and online in March 2022 and showed the man sitting next to his girlfriend in a living room while playing Paddy Power’s Wonder Wheel game on his phone.
His girlfriend’s mother brings the couple a drink, whereupon his girlfriend pops the question, to which the man answers without thinking while continuing to stare at his phone. After the incredulous look of his girlfriend, the man returns to the competition in embarrassment.
The ad narrator then says, “No matter how badly you do it, you’ll always get another chance with Paddy Power games.”
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The advertisement received three complaints from viewers, all of which were upheld. One complainant said the ad showed the man was so busy gambling that he made an “inappropriate remark”.
The UK advertising regulator, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), said the ad “encourages repeated gambling” because it “represents gambling as a priority in life over family”.
A Paddy Power spokesman told the BBC: “Paddy Power is committed to responsible practice and it is always our intention to comply with advertising codes. We accept the ASA’s decision and will consider their broader guidance going forward.”
Complainants to the ASA believed the man was portrayed as letting gambling take precedence over his family life and as being “socially irresponsible”.
Paddy Power defended himself to the ASA, arguing that the ad implied a “commitment to family life” as it depicts the scene of a traditional family setting where the man meets his girlfriend’s parents for Sunday lunch and is “light”. should – sweet”.
Clearcast, the company responsible for deleting adverts before they air in the UK, said the man was simply “awkwardly frank when talking to his girlfriend”.
The ASA informed Paddy Power that its ads must not promote gambling as a “life priority or depict, condone or encourage socially irresponsible gambling” and that the ads could no longer be shown in their current form.
The ruling follows a broader campaign by the ASA to crack down on socially irresponsible advertising and in particular to apply stricter rules on gambling advertising.
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