The British Heart Foundation (BHF) has defended its corporate partnership with gambling company Sky Bet in response to ethical concerns raised by campaigners.
BHF’s Every Minute Matters year-long campaign with Sky Bet began in May and aims to bring awareness to cardiac arrest and get more people to learn CPR.
It hopes to raise up to £3m to support the charity’s work and recruit 270,000 people to start learning CPR through its interactive app, RevivR.
Will Prochaska, director of the Coalition to End Gambling Ads, told Civil Society: “The British Heart Foundation’s support of Sky Bet represents another low for the charity sector in Great Britain.
“It is not the purpose of charities to wash the reputations of harmful industries, and there are few more harmful in the UK than the gambling industry.”
Prochaska, a former CEO of charity Gambling with Lives, accused Sky Bet of “using the BHF to legitimise itself and cleanse its reputation”.
He said: “Gambling causes mental health harm. The BHF is a health charity, which is now trading the mental health of the UK public to raise money to sustain itself. They should know better.”
Researcher Alex May, who wrote a blog post raising concerns about BHF’s partnership with Sky Bet, told Civil Society that he was surprised when he first discovered the collaboration.
He said that while the partnership might help to increase income for the BHF, it did not fit with the charity’s calls for the government to create “a healthier food environment” by limiting advertisements on less healthy products, including sports sponsorships.
“There’s a lot of concern about gambling at the moment in the UK,” said May.
“The fact that the BHF logo is appearing on the campaign alongside the logo of Sky Bet, shows that they are publicising and promoting the gambling firm.”
Charity: ‘The BHF does not promote gambling’
Teresa Hicks, director of corporate fundraising of the foundation, told Civil Society: “The Every Minute Matters campaign with Sky Bet is making significant impact.
“Any partnership we enter only happens if we truly believe it will bring about positive change.
“We are certain that this campaign, which aims to create the largest ever mobilisation of football fans towards a cause, will save lives through training the nation in CPR and raising millions of pounds to fund our lifesaving work.
“The BHF does not promote gambling through this partnership. All partnership activity is focused on promoting CPR via the BHF’s RevivR tool and at no point will we direct people to Sky Bet’s gambling sites.”
The campaign encourages thousands of football fans to learn CPR and make English Football League stadiums safer with the installation of more defibrillators.
Sky Bet’s funding will also go towards CureHeart, a research initiative which aims to bring a cure to clinical trials within five years, according to BHF’s website.
Sky Bet is part of Flutter UKI, which also owns Paddy Power, Betfair and tombola.
A Flutter spokesperson said: “We take our responsibilities to customers and wider society incredibly seriously.
"Since 2020, we have donated more than £70 million to research, education and treatment organisations, including more than £60 million to Gamble Aware. We are extremely proud of our partnership with the British Heart Foundation and are pleased to see the success it is having.”
Editor’s note: Additional comments from Flutter UKI have been added on 2 October
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