Paul Buck admits he had a ’pathological’ gambling disorder which led him down a ’horrendous’ road.

Over a 10-year period he gambled £4.8million across an incredible 93 separate betting accounts.

In all he lost £1.3 million and was jailed for stealing ’nearly half a million quid’ from the bank where he was a regional manager.

And he only handed himself in to the authorities after attempting to take his own life in desperation over his addiction.

Father of three Mr Buck is the founder and chief executive of Epic Risk Management, an independent gambling harm minimisation consultancy.

He regularly makes appearances at events to discuss the financial, legal and regulatory risks that problem gambling can have within the workplace and is now recognised as one of the industry’s leading gambling harm minimisation experts.

He spoke to Business News as he prepared his presentation to a 90-strong audience of gambling operators and regulators at an event held at Noa Bakehouse in Douglas.

It was hosted by SMP Partners’ eGaming division on the first day of ’Responsible Gambling Week, which always starts on the first day of November.

SMP Partners takes social responsibility seriously and has been working closely with GamCare Isle of Man through the ’umbrella’ charity Motiv8.

Mr Buck explained that his presentation focuses on six levels of gambling addiction.

And he admits he was once at the sixth and most dangerous stage.

He told Business News: ’There is no doubt that I was a pathological gambler.

’These six stages go on an ever destructive path and I was at stage six.’

Mr Buck, 42, said he was at university in 1994 and joined the football team where he discovered the other players were all big gamblers, even at the age of 18.

’Within three or four days it was all about gambling.

’I placed my first bet which was a £10 each way on a 33 to one outsider in the horse racing. The horse should bever have won, it had never finished a race before and it won so I ended up getting nearly £500 quid back.

’From that day onwards I was a gambler. And there was not a day from then for 17 years when I did not place a bet.

’Just during the period between 2001 and 2011 I transacted £4.8 million across 93 separate betting accounts.

’I lost £1.3 million and it was pretty horrendous.

’You talk about where gambling can take you, and in my case of the £1.3 million quid I actually lost half of it from the bank that I worked for where I was a regional manager. So I eventually ended up in prison for two years and eight months.’

’And it was in prison that the idea of Epic Risk Management was put together.

’We now work with professional sports people, criminal justice, the armed forces, financialservices, education and the gambling industry.

’The whole aim is that we need to make gambling safer, we need to make it fairer.

’And by working with organisations in the highest risk sectors it will stop a lot of gambling related harm’.

Recalling his gambling Mr Buck said he started with gambling on the horses but progressed to betting on literally ’everything’.

He said: ’When I first started in 1994 you could really only bet in cash in a bookie’s office, it was a very different world, it was far more difficult to gamble than you can now.

’You could only really bet on horses, dogs and the football pools.

’Now in any one football match there are 136 different markets including bet in play and live markets.

’You can place a bet within 12 seconds on any one of 2,000 worldwide gambling sites on your mobile phone.

’So people could be gambling while listening to me tonight.

’It is so much more easy now and it’s 24/7 and it’s anonymous. That’s why the problem is such a growing issue.’

Mr Buck, who is based in the north west of England, said that ’thankfully’ he is still married.

’I handed myself in the day after I attempted to take my own life at work, I was literally as rock bottom as I could be .

’My wife had no idea what had been going on for 10 years, she thought I’d been having an affair. It says more about her than about me that we are still together, and now as happy with three kids, they are 14, 12 and eight now and I think myself lucky every day now that I am here at all and that my relationships with my wife and family are as as strong as ever.’

’I went to prison for fraud, of the £1.3 million that I lost, I had stolen £434,000 from them. It was so far from my moral compass it was unreal.

’Growing up I never even nicked a Mars bar from the corner shop, then suddenly the gambling addiction takes over and you go through those different stages of the gambling spectrum and before you know it you’re nicking nearly half a million quid from your employer.

’That’s what gambling can do to you.

’It can be damaging on so many different fronts if it goes out of control.

’But let’s not forget that most people can gamble and stay in control of time, money and cognition or brain space.

’But for those that can’t, it usually ends up ina place where they do not want it to end up.’

Mr Buck said nobody would intentionally go over that ’invisible line’ into problem gambling.

Ted Pepper, head of eGaming operations at SMP Partners and Jade Zorab, head of corporate development at SMP Partners talked about the event which the firm, based in Clinch’s House, Lord, Street, Douglas, was hosting.

The event took place on the first day of an annual nationwide initiative called Responsible Gambling Week.

Mr Pepper said: ’A lot of the work we do at SMP Partners, particularly in the training sphere, crosses into areas of problem gambling and responsible gambling.

’Also we like to ensure that our staff are fully educated.

’We have a lot of young staff so we like to ensure they are fully informed. While there is a lot of glamour to the gaming side of things there is also a side to it that we need to be careful of and wary of, from an education point of view.

’The guys from Epic Risk Management, who are our speakers, are a consultancy firm, essentially five gentlement who have previously had issues with gambling. They are from all types of backgrounds.

’They are working with the likes of the army, schools and various other initiatives to give some real niche personal perspectives of some of the issues they had to ensure others don’t follow the same fate.

’More recently they have been working with the gaming community to ensure that gaming operators are fully aware of patterns of play and activities to look out for, again to protect their players.’

Jade said: ’It’s all about raising awareness and being responsible so it is embracing their culture of being responsible and just educating those around us and indeed our own employees about potentially looking at the risk factor involved and generally being a bit more responsible about what we do.’

Mr Pepper said around 60 gaming industry specialists from the island and 30 staff from the gaming department at SMP Partners were at the event.

He said it was important that companies such as SMP, which works with gaming firms, were involved.

SMP also announced a new partnership with the charity Gamcare Isle of Man, which comes under the Motiv8 umbrella in the island.

Mr Pepper said: ’SMP Partners have worked very closely with Motiv8/Gamcare for a number of years and we were instrumental in helping them to maintain their funding and that relationship has become stronger and stronger.’

’So much so that we have written an Isle of Man specific responsible gambling course thatwill be delivered by the SMP training academy. This course will be available to the entire island industry particularly those that have supported Motiv8/Gamcare.

’So following this event we will go out to the industry and wider gaming community to offer a free course to all staff that are employed in the sector.

It will be in co-ordination with Motiv8/Gamcare.’

Mr Pepper said he hoped it would be a ground breaking initiative that would raise the profile of Motiv8/Gamcare in the island to maintain its relevance and also as an educational tool for the island, as a responsible place to work

’It’s really making a statement that the Isle of Man takes responsible gambling seriously.’

Jade Zorab said SMP has been involved in the gaming space for 10 years now.

Paul Buck, founder and chief executive Epic Risk Management, Lyndsey Smart, deputy director Motiv8, Ted Pepper, SMP Partners’ head of eGaming risk and operations, Holly Cordas, addiction support worker Motiv8 and Mark Potter, business development head for Epic Risk Management