GamCare has announced the appointment of Chris Thornton as its new Director of Operations, with overall responsibility for the delivery and performance of GamCare’s national and regional services, including the National Gambling Helpline. Chris joins the Executive Leadership Team at a pivotal time for the gambling support sector.

Chris brings extensive senior leadership experience spanning the NHS, voluntary sector and health commissioning. He joins GamCare from the British Red Cross, where as Director for the North of England and Isle of Man he led multi-disciplinary health and care operations, managing around 100 staff and £3m in annual income from NHS and local authority commissioned services, delivering measurable reductions in emergency department attendance, hospital readmissions and reliance on formal social care.

Chris has built and led services at scale throughout his career. At Primary Care Sheffield he led city-wide clinical services and co-led successful bids worth £22m. At St John Ambulance he created the East Midlands region and grew its charitable output by 365% while reducing costs by 61%. He is a Chartered Companion of the Chartered Management Institute and served for eight years on the Nursing and Midwifery Council’s Fitness to Practise Committee.

Chris Thornton, incoming Director of Operations at GamCare, said: “I’m thrilled to join GamCare at such an important moment for the organisation and for everyone working to reduce gambling harms across the UK. GamCare operates at national scale, running the UK’s only round-the-clock specialist support service for gambling harms, combining the National Gambling Helpline, live chat, online communities and self-guided tools with thousands of structured treatment sessions and prevention and education programmes reaching tens of thousands of people each year.

“That combination of specialist expertise, integrated delivery and frontline impact is rare in any sector, and is shaping how effective support for gambling harms is understood and delivered. I’m looking forward to building on those foundations and to playing my part in ensuring GamCare’s services continue to meet growing demand as the sector evolves.”

Victoria Corbishley, CEO of GamCare, said: “I’m delighted to welcome Chris to GamCare and to the Executive Leadership Team. He brings exactly the combination of strategic and operational leadership that reflects how we work, significant experience of leading complex health and community services at scale, a strong track record of evidencing impact, and a deep commitment to reaching people who are often underserved. I look forward to working closely with him as we continue to deliver and develop our national services.”

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GamCare has seen a record number of people taking the next step into treatment and peer-based support following contact with the National Gambling Helpline and GamCare’s live chat.

• Made 996 referrals to treatment and peer-based support services in January 2026, up from 674 in January 2025 – a 48% increase year-on-year.

• Excluding referrals to peer-based support – Money Guidance Service and Way Forward – treatment referrals rose to 742 (compared to 603 in Jan 2025).

• Only three months in the past five years have seen higher numbers of referrals, and they have all fallen in the last year: 1165 in October 2025, 1022 in September 2025, and 1077 in August 2025.

Victoria Corbishley, GamCare’s CEO, said: “More people affected by gambling harms are choosing to start treatment. The National Gambling Helpline is a 24/7, confidential route to support, and our advisers rapidly connect people with free, specialist help across Great Britain. That first conversation remains the crucial turning point.”

What this tells

• People are moving from “help-seeking” to “treatment-starting” faster. The proportion of target calls converting into treatment has increased markedly, suggesting callers are more ready to engage in structured support and that referral pathways are working efficiently. Nationally, the National Gambling Helpline is the most common route into treatment.

• Specialist wraparound help is reaching the right people. Flexible and person-centred services plug critical gaps identified in recent evaluations of the UK treatment landscape.

• Service users can now access multiple, diverse avenues for support. On average, the number of referrals per client in January has increased each year for those referred (1.1 in 2023-24, 1.2 in 2024-24, 1.3 in 2025-26).

• New data demonstrates GamCare’s public health approach to tackling gambling harm. Gambling harm affects individuals, families and communities, with well documented mental health and financial impacts. Public health reviews emphasise prevention and rapid access to treatment; improving conversion from helpline contact to treatment is a key step in reducing harm.

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• Number of people seeking financial guidance since start of 2025 already higher than whole of last year.
• Over £5m in gambling debts reported since January, almost double compared to whole of 2024.
• June, July, August months see doubling of registrations year-on-year.

More people are seeking support with their finances due to gambling-related financial problems, according to the support charity GamCare.

According to new data, the number of registrations to the charity’s Money Guidance Service in 2025 has already surpassed the total number of referrals through the whole of 2024, with 1,151 people having been referred into the service since January, up from 923 people over the whole of 2024.

Additionally, June, July and August this year have all seen a doubling or more of referrals when compared with the same months last year, with August showing the highest number for any month on record with 198 referrals.*

Those who have entered the service since January this year have reported collective debts of over £5.3m in total, an average of £4,682 per person. The total amount of debt reported in the first eight months of this year has almost doubled compared to the entire of last year, when it stood at over £2.8 million across the entire year.

The charity is particularly concerned about incidents where people are using business funds to gamble and incurring high levels of debt, reaching millions of pounds in some cases. There is also concern for people struggling financially who are looking to cover essential bills through gambling winnings.

GamCare is the founder of the National Gambling Helpline, a 24/7, 365-day-a-year helpline that anyone can receive free, confidential support for gambling harms.

The charity established the Money Guidance Service in 2022 to support people with the financial impact that gambling harm can lead to, which people can access for free when calling the National Gambling Helpline.

Since the beginning of 2024, practitioners in the service have also helped people identify over £60,000 in unclaimed benefits as opportunities to help improve their financial situation.

Kathy Wade, Money Guidance Service Manager, commented: “We often hear from people who struggle with gambling that it doesn’t feel like real money they are betting with. A lot of the people we see are young men who are looking for big financial wins either through gambling or even cryptocurrency investing, but it can lead to riskier behaviours around these activities.

“It is especially difficult for people who look to gambling to make extra money for their daily household costs, which continue to feel squeezed by rising pressures. We know that many people gamble safely, but we would not encourage anyone to gamble with the goal of making extra money to cover their essential bills.

“Our team are here for anyone who may be unsure of the financial impact that gambling may be having on them, whether their own gambling or someone else’s. Contact GamCare’s National Gambling Helpline now on 0808 8020 133 for more information on how you can get started, and we can help you get back on track.”

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