Barry Faudemer has begun a four-year term as chair of the Jersey Gambling Commission, bringing a background in policing, financial-crime enforcement and regulation to the island’s gambling watchdog.
He was formerly the head of the Joint Police and Customs Financial Crimes Unit, and before that served as director of enforcement at the Jersey Financial Services Commission from 2007 to 2020. He also spent 27 years in the police and studied money laundering typologies and terrorist financing at the FBI Academy in the United States.
Faudemer’s work has included helping develop Jersey’s Financial Services Law 1998 and the Proceeds of Crime Law 1999. He founded the Jersey Fraud Prevention Forum and produced the island’s Money Laundering Typology document on behalf of the government. The commission said his experience spans regulation, financial-crime prevention and law enforcement.
The appointment follows his earlier entry to the commission board in August 2025. He succeeds Cyril Whelan, who completed the maximum 10-year tenure last November. A government paper on the board appointments said the vacancy was advertised from 17 April to 30 May, drew 13 applications and led to interviews on 3 and 4 July.
Under Jersey law, commissioners are appointed by the minister from among people nominated by the chairman. The same paper said the commission is funded entirely from licence and permit fees, receives no public funding and creates no resource implications for the government.
The commission regulates remote gambling, land-based commercial gambling and social or charitable gambling. Its responsibilities include making sure products are fair, protecting children and vulnerable people, and preventing fraud, money laundering and other gambling-related crime. The Channel Islands Lottery sits outside its jurisdiction.
The board no longer handles frontline licensing decisions. In June 2025 it delegated permitted functions to the chief executive, while keeping oversight of budgets, policy and material cases.
The regulator also revised its remote responsible gambling code in October 2025, for the first time since 2019. Operators must give customers accessible information about player protection and support services, offer loss, deposit and session limits, and wait 24 hours before increasing customer-set limits.
The code also requires self-exclusion periods of at least six months and at least five years. Customers who want to reactivate an account must contact customer service and then complete a further one-day cooling-off period. Operators must assess affordability, source of funds and vulnerability before awarding VIP status, and staff cannot be rewarded on the basis of a customer’s losses, spending or gambling activity.
In its recent annual report, the commission said the capacity of health services to deal with problem gambling was “severely under strain”. It recorded nine direct interactions concerning problem gambling involving six people during 2025, and said three or four Islanders a year arrive at its offices in crisis.
