ONE of Britain's largest bookmakers is failing to protect gambling addicts who want to exclude themselves from their shops, a Sunday Herald investigation has revealed.

Ladbrokes had been forced, along with every other gambling operator, to improve its self-exclusion schemes after the Gambling Act 2005 finally came into force on September 1 this year.

The legislation was the greatest single shake-up of the industry since 1945 and aims to provide more support for the 250,000 "official" problem gamblers identified by research published last month, although unofficially the figure is believed to be many times higher.

Despite that, one of our reporters was able to breach the self-exclusion system at Ladbrokes, one of the UK's biggest betting companies with hundreds of shops across Scotland.

He gambled freely on a touch-screen roulette machine in two out of three branches in Glasgow, almost one week after he barred himself under the firm's voluntary self-exclusion scheme - which operates for a minimum of six months and a maximum of five years.

Our reporter signed up to Ladbrokes' self-exclusion policy in the Kinning Park area of the city on October 18. He signed and dated an application form, which included a passport-style photograph of himself naming two other branches from which he wanted to be barred.

He was given an advice leaflet from GamCare, an industry-backed charity which provides support for gamblers and which supports the introduction of a UK-wide self-exclusion scheme, entitled Staying In Control. The leaflet also contains contact numbers for GamCare's national helpline.

The staff member told our reporter he would be barred from all the stores from that date, October 18, and the paperwork was sent to Ladbrokes' head office and the regional manager.

Last Tuesday, the reporter walked into a near-deserted Ladbrokes branch in Cambuslang and was given change from £5 by the sole male cashier before he used it to play roulette. Later, he went into a busier Ladbrokes close to Glasgow Central Station, which was also on his list of barred branches, and was given change to play roulette.

Minutes later, after winning £9 from his £1 stake, he took his receipt to the cashier, who cashed his winnings without challenging him.

As fans gathered to place bets on Rangers' Champions League tie against Barcelona, our reporter returned to play at the firm's branch in Kinning Park where he had signed his self-exclusion form. But the woman recognised his face, after studying the list of barred customers, and refused to serve him.

Last month, the Sunday Herald joined Marcello Celini, 36, who claimed to have blown his £25,000 divorce settlement in three months playing roulette, in three betting shops from which he barred himself in Edinburgh.

He is self-excluded from every branch of the three leading bookmakers in both Glasgow and Edinburgh, where he lives. According to Ladbrokes this makes it more difficult to enforce because staff are often not familiar with customers from other outlets.

Marcello, a taxi driver, said: "It's a law they do not enforce. Only yesterday I walked into a shop from which I was supposedly barred and lost £100. People might think I'm stupid, but it's like drugs. I can bet £15 on roulette machines and within 30 to 45 minutes have made £600, then lost it in another half an hour.

"I've had my credit card confiscated for going over the £3000 limit, stolen petty cash from my mum and dad and pawned gold to get money and it's cost me my marriage. I'm an unlucky gambler, but a gambler is never a winner. The most I've won is £3000, which I can blow in 10 minutes."

The father-of-two claimed that despite self-excluding, he could "breeze in and gamble away as if nothing had happened", adding: "I was told it takes 24 hours to be excluded from all the premises, but I could even walk into the one where I had signed the forms originally to bar myself. They only care about making money from other people's misery."

Count Me Out, a not-for-profit organisation based in Lowestoft, Suffolk, launched a UK-wide self-exclusion scheme in August at GamCare's request. However, it has only attracted 100 betting firms, with many major companies boycotting it because they fear it could breach the Data Protection Act.

Founder Gary Pettengell said: "The laughable thing is, we were tasked to set it up by GamCare, which had concerns independent operators, especially bookmakers, would not be able to comply with the new self-exclusion rules.

"We got a nationwide scheme up and running before the new act, but the industry said it would be too expensive to run. It would only cost an operator £1 a day for each of their premises to take part. How is that prohibitive, when gambling is having a terrible impact on a small number of people and their families?"

Nicola Crewe-Read, a GamCare spokeswoman, highlighted the importance of every member of staff being trained to comply with the newly-created Gambling Commission's rules, which states staff must be "socially responsible" towards their customers.

She said: "There is a renewed effort to bring everybody to the table and develop a nationwide system. It's more difficult for the terrestrial operators because of data protection issues and we are working on a solution."

Ladbrokes said any request for self-exclusion takes at least five days to process, not immediately, as staff had told our reporter, and that the other branches he visited were not aware of his application when he visited.

It said in a statement: "Ladbrokes takes self-exclusion very seriously, having pioneered it as a tool to assist problem gamblers in tackling their recovery. Self-exclusion is always most effective at a customer's regular shop or those in the locality of where they live and are known to staff, but we do our utmost to enforce it as widely as is practically possible and constantly review the process."

Gamblers Anonymous has meetings throughout Scotland and can be contacted 24 hours a day on 0870 050 8881 or via www.gascotland.org. The GamCare helpline is on 0845 6000 133 or visit www.gamcare.org.uk