The state councilor of Podemos Roberto Sotomayor emphasizes that the Region is the community in Europe “with the most bookmakers per inhabitant”
United We can held this Saturday morning, at the Murcia Artillery Barracks, an act on the problem of gambling among young people and against gambling houses. Roberto Sotomayor, counselor of Podemos, was present at the event. Which highlighted that, according to the data, there are “more than a million and a half people in this country who suffer from pathological gambling disorder”, to which should be added “the more than 600,000 who are estimated to be undiagnosed.”
As indicated by the counselor of Podemos, “more than 7,000 minors admit that they gamble daily.” The state citizen counselor of Podemos pointed out that the Region is the community in Europe “with the most gambling houses per inhabitant”, at a time when statistics “point to gambling as the third cause of youth suicide.” Sotomayor demanded that the political class “get serious about this issue”, because “the kids are killing us.”
Sotomayor highlighted the project of the Balearic Islands, a community in which a reform of the preliminary draft of the Gaming Law is being carried out that puts on the table “a great social pact”, with different entities such as the OCU, UNICEF, Red Cross or the Federation of Associations of Fathers and Mothers. Faced with these examples, Sotomayor placed the Region of Murcia as “the worst possible scenario”, with a regional government whose “political coexistence with the gaming sector is infumable.”
For her part, the spokesperson for Podemos in the Regional Assembly, María Marín, described gambling as “a tremendous public health problem” that is affecting “no longer adults, but more and more young people.” He also pointed out that the regional government “has been promising for more than 10 years a regulation to regulate the proliferation of the number of gambling and betting houses in the Region of Murcia”, something of which “there is still nothing in progress.”
The regional deputy highlights that from United We can have been trying to regulate this matter in the Regional Assembly for several years, introducing changes in Law 2/95 that “put a brake on gambling” in the Region of Murcia. Marín regretted that from the executive headed by López Miras “there has been no response.” The spokeswoman for Podemos describes it as “very serious” that the regional government “has promoted tax credits for a sector as rich as gambling for a decade.”
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