NHS chief accused of failing to disclose Gambling with Lives conflict of interest
Matthew Gaskell, head of the NHS Northern Gambling Service, is alleged to have failed to make clear in a timely fashion that his wife is employed by Gambling with Lives
Matt Gaskell, consultant psychologist and head of the NHS Northern Gambling Service, has been accused of deliberately failing to declare a conflict of interest regarding his wife’s job at Gambling with Lives.
The complaint comes from Jordan Lea, CEO and founder of gambling-related harms awareness and education charity Deal Me Out.
In February 2022, Gaskell provided expert witness testimony at the inquest into the death of Jack Ritchie. At age 24, Ritchie took his own life after struggling with gambling-related harm, which in turn prompted his parents Liz and Charles Ritchie to found the charity Gambling with Lives.
In that same year, Gaskell’s wife, Judith, started her role at Gambling with Lives, using her maiden name of Williams.
In July 2022, concerns were first raised over the potential conflict of interest given her husband’s job title by an anonymous whistleblower within the organisation direct to Lea.
In November 2022, Gambling with Lives was approached for comment by Lea regarding whether Gaskell’s wife or any close relative was employed by the charity, but that request went ignored.
Then, in July 2023, Gaskell provided evidence to a parliamentary select committee regarding gambling regulation on which Will Prochaska, then-strategy director at Gambling with Lives, as well as the charity’s co-founder and co-chair Charles Ritchie also presented evidence.
Just a week before the select committee hearing, Gaskell filed a declaration of interest certificate at the NHS Leeds and York (NHS LYPT) Trust in which he declared he had no conflicts of interests for the period leading up to 13 June 2023.
As recently as 20 August this year, the Gambling with Lives website openly stated Judith Gaskell joined the charity in 2022 after a 15-year career with the NHS.
However, eight days later, and after receiving an approach for comment on the matter by EGR, Judith’s bio section on the Gambling with Lives website appears to have been updated so that it now explains she started in July of 2022.
The timings with Gaskell’s first declaration certificate in the summer of 2023, in which he claims he had no conflicts of interest, mean that there was a period of overlap that was omitted from his conflict of interest.
Additionally, Gaskell was named the topic lead on gambling clinical guidelines for the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in September 2022.
Much like the declaration made to NHS LYPT, Gaskell did not initially declare the conflict of interests regarding his wife’s job to NICE.
His NICE register of interests profile has since been updated and now outlines that though the conflict of interests arose in July 2022, it was not declared until November 2023.
In the update, Gaskell tagged the ‘type of interest’ as “indirect” with a corresponding note which read: “My wife is head of family support for the charity, Gambling with Lives.”
This is despite the fact that NICE guidelines state “all declarations of interest should be made before taking up a role (this should include all current interests and those which occurred in the preceding 12 months)”.
March 2024 saw an investigation conducted by NHS LYPT service manager Amanda Taylor, after a complaint was made by a member of the public against Gaskell to the Trust.
The investigation found that when it comes to Judith Gaskell’s employment “the relevant declarations have been made via the Trust’s governance process”.
The Trust continued, stating: “The service does not have any formal contact arrangements in place with Gambling with Lives, however both organisations share an interest in supporting harm reduction of those with a gambling addiction.”
However, two weeks after the complaint was made and the investigation was conducted by Taylor, Gaskell filed two separate declarations of interest on 11 April and 15 April 2024.
The first filing backdated his conflict of interest to June 2022 and the second filing to June 2023.
In those amendments, he addressed how occasionally, his and his wife’s “paths cross”, citing “events, conferences, media appearances, government roundtables, or select committees” as examples.
Gaskell claimed in both amendments: “We have no direct connection through work, nor do we share service users. My wife’s support services for families cannot benefit from my work for the NHS nor do we benefit from her work.
“The charity has an arm of its work where it advocates for reform of our gambling laws using the voice of lived experience and the evidence from the deaths the families have experienced.
“Sometimes our paths cross for example at events and conferences, media appearances, government roundtables or select committees.”
At no point during the declaration did Gaskell disclose that he has appeared in videos that feature on Gambling with Lives’ YouTube channel.
Emails seen by EGR reveal a complaint has been made against Gaskell to the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman.
The complaint claims that Gaskell has shown favourable treatment to his wife’s charity and “actively abused and spread falsehoods about the RET [research, education and treatment] sector”.
The complainant has also argued that Gaskell has “deliberately under reported his relationship with Gambling with Lives to the Trust in his conflict of interests”.
Speaking to EGR, bookmaker Geoff Banks called for Gaskell to step down from his post as NHS Northern Gambling service chief as a result of his ties to Gambling with Lives.
“Gaskell has deliberately hidden his direct association with Gambling with Lives and his family’s and I think that is just abhorrent behaviour on his part, and he should resign,” Banks said.
“He shouldn’t be speaking about the NHS and doing these things and making representations and trying to shake gambling policy without being absolutely clear and transparent about his situation.”
“It does appear the so-called timeline, if you look into the timeline of when a complaint went into the trust about what was going on here, that suddenly, Matt Gaskill rushed to make a declaration after a complaint went in,” he added.
EGR has contacted both Matt Gaskell and Gambling with Lives for comment on multiple occasions.
In Gaskell’s case, there has been no confirmation of receipt of those messages or any comment.
Gambling with Lives declined to comment when approached by EGR. However, the charity indicated that Judith Gaskell’s bio had since been updated to include her start date.
The NHS Leeds & York Partnership Trust declined to address the matter when approached by EGR.