Sarah Gardner has dedicated nearly 17 years to the Gambling Commission, taking on various roles throughout her tenure. The diverse challenges within the gambling sector are what keep her engaged.
In a recent interview with GGB, Gardner expressed, "From a regulatory standpoint it’s a really interesting sector because you’re really trying to strike the right balance between enabling people to enjoy what they enjoy doing in their leisure time, while making sure there are protections for those that need it.
"It’s why I’ve never left. [In this time] I’ve done most of the jobs actually around the senior table at the Commission."
Currently, Gardner is serving as interim CEO, stepping in after Andrew Rhodes departed from the role in February. This year has seen multiple changes within the Commission’s senior leadership, with policy director Tim Miller also announcing plans to leave in June. During his time at iGB Live in July, Miller fondly reflected on his decade with the regulator. Part of his responsibilities will be transitioned to Sarah Fox, a senior civil servant from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), starting in September.
Despite this period of transition, Gardner humorously describes herself as a "Gambling Commission lifer." She stated, "The Commission’s proved quite difficult to leave. I think there is always a new challenge. Someone once described it to me as gambling regulation is utterly seductive. And I’m not sure I get that far, but it certainly keeps you really interested."
Gardner aims to cultivate a more creative approach at the Commission, emphasizing that regulation doesn’t always have to be heavy-handed.
"Regulation can be a pretty thankless task because you can never please all the people. I can’t think of any announcement I’ve ever made where I haven’t had one half of the debate saying: ‘oh that doesn’t go far enough,’ and the other half saying: ‘oh, it might go too far.’ That can actually be a bit of an indicator that you’re broadly in the right place," she remarked.
One particularly contentious subject has been the Commission's handling of affordability checks, also referred to as financial risk assessments (FRAs). A pilot conducted in 2025 flagged high-spending players across several tier-one operators for additional credit checks by independent agencies. After delaying its update earlier this year, the Commission confirmed in July that FRAs would be formally introduced through a phased approach, receiving pushback from various sectors, including horse racing and certain political figures.
Gardner commented on the current approach to financial risk assessments, saying, "What we’re currently doing on financial risk assessments, controversial though that it is, is a really good example of striking a balance [between player enjoyment and consumer protection] because that is about finding a more sophisticated way than currently exists to hone in on the consumers who actually need the support.
"So you don’t have to ask a much larger sample of consumers for [additional] documents, which strikes me as frankly too intrusive for what’s meant to be a leisure activity."
