LETTER: Instant thrills hold no fears

From Mr David Rigg

Sir: Dr E. Moran's letter (18 April) on the subject of Instant scratch cards merits some response. While naturally there may be comment that some people could become addicted to instant games, as indeed they may to horse racing or alcohol, there seems little evidence that this is other than a potential danger for relatively few unfortunate people.

Scratch cards have been available in this country for many years, and prior to the advent of the National Lottery were selling a total of some £50m each year, sometimes with top prizes of up to £25,000. Very little concern about them has been expressed to date.

The largest Instants game market in the world is in France, with sales of around £l.8bn annually. Few people would characterise the French as being a nation of addicted gamblers. Here the number of tickets sold each week is large because up to 30 million people are playing the National Lottery, in one form or another, spending probably about £3.50 each on average.

Yours faithfully,

DAVID RIGG

Communications Director

Camelot

Watford

19 April