Here’s a good op ed, published in the Huffington Post, highlighting how the UK’s Labour Party would go further on tackling gambling addiction. As I reflect on this article, my mind cast over the growing politics of addiction – including drugs, alcohol, gambling and obesity. On the left, the approach demands growing state-involvement. Meanwhile, on the right, the viewpoint is increasingly that it’s the respobsibility of the individual and and his/her family. My political views are well known and I do not subscribe to the view that gambling addiction should be the latest disease to be addressed by the NHS. But I do think that government intervention on all addictions is way behind the curve. Having spent most of my career delivering strategic change, I think that governments must take a holistic approach to addiction, regarding it increasingly as a strategic challenge. After all, consider how China suffered in the Opium Wars?

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