Revealed: Football League clubs taking cut of gamblers’ losses with SkyBet

English football clubs have been taking a cut of the money fans lose with the bookmaker SkyBet, the Guardian can reveal, prompting accusations that they are exploiting supporters and gambling addicts.

An internal document shows that members of the Football League (EFL), made up of the 72 clubs outside the Premier League, operated as “affiliates” for SkyBet. An affiliate is a middleman who encourages a gambler to bet with a particular company, which then pays them a percentage of the money that person goes on to lose, sometimes for the rest of their life.

The document states that clubs were entitled to a “share of losses […] from accounts registered in your club name to Sky Bet through our affiliate partnership”.

The EFL said that the arrangement, which lasted six years, was scrapped at the start of the 2019-20 season but admitted that some clubs were still receiving funds under the “legacy” contracts and would continue cashing in until the end of the 2023-24 season.

The Guardian understands that one League Two club made £5,000 from the deal in a year, indicating potentially much larger sums for the best-supported Championship teams.

Campaigners and MPs condemned the relationship, called on Premier League clubs to reveal whether they have any similar deals, and said the revelation should give fresh impetus to government plans to reform gambling laws.

Whitehall sources have suggested that a draft white paper outlining potential reforms, put together under Boris Johnson’s leadership, could fall victim to a bonfire of regulations under the new prime minister, Liz Truss. But the shadow minister for sport, Alex Davies-Jones, said the plans should not be scrapped, warning that evidence of affiliate deals “raises some serious