Experts, Liberal MP hope for full ban on sports betting ads as advocates cite mental health decline

Sports betting advertising in Ontario, Alberta and eventually Quebec could soon be limited by a bill introduced by a senator who points to findings of increased addiction and gambling-related harms and suicides in Ontario in the five years since single-game betting was legalized federally.

Sen. Marty Deacon introduced Bill S-211 in May 2025. It's now before the House standing committee on Canadian heritage for study.

"I hope this legislation gets to a point where we can ban (sports betting ads) completely across this country," said Liberal MP Michael Coteau.

His remarks came after testimony from Deacon and Liberal MP Bardish Chagger, sponsors of the bill in the Senate and House of Commons respectively. 

In her opening statement to the committee, Deacon cited a University of Toronto study which found that visits to the emergency room related to gambling disorders in Ontario had nearly doubled since the 2021 legalization of single-event sports betting and 2022 expansion of private online gambling markets in the province.

"Gambling harms are particularly insidious because it's hard for friends and family to pick up on this," Deacon said.

"There is a natural friction with substance addiction, you have to experience the urge, physically move to go to a store or a dealer. For a gambling addiction it takes literal seconds between seeing an ad and placing a bet at one of the casinos in our pockets.

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"We can do so on the bus, out at a bar, or even here in this room right now."

Chagger referenced multiple studies about young men and young boys are disproportionately affected by