Andrew Willcox (Dawson, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Credit and Other Measures) Bill 2023. For many Aussies, taking a punt is part of everyday life. It's almost as if our cultural stereotype is being a laidback lad or lady throwing another shrimp on the barbie, and our life depends on it. We're nonchalant about everything else. Why not with our money? After all, you can't take it with you. Everyone here knows someone who frequently visits the track for a bet on the dogs or the horses, loves their Keno in the afternoon or can't go past backing their favourite footy team in the grand final, even if the odds are not in their favour. How many of your local pubs have rows and rows of pokies calling your name when you've gone for a cold one with your mates? And Santa? Well, according to him, scratchies are the ideal Chrissie present for your favourite friend, family member or even your favourite coworker during the office Christmas shindig.

Gambling has always been prominent in Australia, and since COVID and the shutdown of our favourite local watering holes, Australians have embraced online gambling wholeheartedly. A quick Google search will show a list of at least 138 online-gambling websites ready and waiting to take your money. Some are backed by Australian companies, others are backed by overseas-owned companies, making super profits off the back of hardworking Australians. The thrill of a win and chasing that addictive dopamine hit over and over again can have dire consequences, leading to harm for the gambler and their families, careers and relationships. The stark reality is that it can destroy lives, and as policy makers it is our job and our responsibility to adopt sensible policies that reduce harm to our people.

Earlier this year, the coalition took positive steps with a bill to ban gambling advertisements during live sporting events. It was a policy that we know had strong support from the community, because they're sensible people, unlike the Labor Party, who—surprise, surprise—oppose the bill, even when they know families and kids will be watching. To that point, more and more frequently we are seeing online video games play ads that are appealing to children and other young people promoting online simulated gambling games. How are they paying for these? It is with mum and dad's credit card that's linked to the Google or Apple Pay account, sometimes without their parents' knowledge. Now Australians are gambling with credit, and they don't even know it.

To do our job and to mitigate harm, this bill we're talking about today, the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Credit and Other Measures) Bill 2023, aims to do just that—to reduce harm to everyday Aussies who might not have the ability to self-regulate when it comes to their gambling decisions. This bill is, in large part, a result of an inquiry by former Speaker and member for Fisher, Mr Andrew Wallace, and a report from the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services. The committee investigated the regulation of the use of financial services, such as credit cards and digital wallets, for online gambling in Australia and delivered a report that was published in late 2021. The most important recommendation to come out of this report is to ban the use of credit cards, digital wallets that are linked to credit cards, digital currency and cryptocurrency in online gambling. This recommendation would bring online gambling in line with offline gambling. The average punter is unable to walk into a pub, a TAB or a casino or other gambling venue and use their credit card to place a bet. The use of credit cards in physical venues was banned in the early 2000s. But today, in 2023, anyone can sit on their couch, in their office or even right here in Parliament House and place a bet online—day or night—with their credit card at the touch of a button. It really doesn't make sense.

For anyone who is a little bit worried about the adverse effects of this bill, it was also recommended that any changes that are made do not have any negative consequences for lotteries, including not-for-profits, charities and newsagents. We all know that charities and not-for-profits benefit greatly from such activities, and we are not here to negatively impact those organisations. What we want to do, as I said before, is minimise harm for those that are most at risk. We already know that traditional gambling and people who gamble with their own money can fall into trouble. However, the world of online gambling utilises credit, and racking up a debt can send people into a whole new world of hurt and financial and emotional stress. What may or may not shock some people is that Australia is by far the gambling capital of the world when it comes to gambling losses per capita. Total consumer losses in Australia in 2018-19 were approximately $25 billion. Research conducted by the gambling treatment and research clinic at the University of Sydney found that over half of the online gamblers surveyed who used their credit cards met the criteria for problem gambling, and one fifth of Australian consumers were using their credit card with their online gambling accounts.

I think it is important to differentiate between credit cards and debit cards. What the bill is recommending is not the ban to use debit cards or Mastercard debit cards. It's to ban the use of credit cards. It's about stopping an addictive gambler's ability to borrow lines of credit, which often come with extremely high transactional costs and even higher personal costs. When credit providers process gambling transactions, they treat them as cash advances. As such, these transactions can attract interest rates as high as 25 per cent, which are applied from the instant the transaction is made. Much like when you're using plastic to pay for anything else, there is the total mental disconnect between the transaction and the thought of ever having to pay it off. Then, all of a sudden, your credit card statement has arrived. Let's say you spent $1,000 that month on gambling, and you've incurred a 25 per cent interest on top of that. Times that by 12 months in the year, and the simple maths says that that's a hell of a lot of dosh.

Which demographic spends more of their household disposable income on gambling every year? If you guessed the low-income earners, you would be correct. And I'll give you this little bit of trivia for free: problem gamblers in low-income households spend the equivalent of four times their average yearly utility bills on gambling. Do you think that during an Albanese Labor government created cost-of-living crisis our households, particularly our low-income households, can afford to fall prey to online gambling addictions and extraordinary amounts of credit card debt? No; I don't think so. Even the biggest stakeholders in the gambling game support the amendments to this bill. So really it's a no-brainer.

Responsible Wagering Australia, the peak body for the gambling industry, has given this bill their full support. SportsBet have voiced their support and back the introduction of a ban on Australian online gambling services accepting credit cards and digital currencies as payment methods. The Alliance for Gambling Reform says that it advocates for and supports a ban on credit card use for online gambling. Financial Counselling Australia welcomes the ban. And the Australian Banking Association supports the ban and welcomes the establishment of consistency across online and offline gambling.

The gambling industry clearly supports clamping down on credit card use for online gambling, and we should as well. And while I understand that there are those who believe such decisions about using credit cards should be left to the individual, this bill is paramount to protecting the people of Australia and their families from the potential harm from problem gambling as well as the social cost, including the cost of crime committed to fund gambling addictions, loss of productivity and work related costs, family and relationship breakdowns, divorce and bankruptcy, potential homelessness as well as emotional and psychological issues, including distress, depression, suicide and violence, which costs Australians billions of dollars a year. It is far too great to ignore, and it's about time online gambling played by the same rules as offline gambling.

While I support this bill, there is, however, one inclusion made by the Labor government that I take issue with. I am talking about the Labor government's patterns in the chamber all the time, and of course the pattern of the Albanese Labor government—getting too excited and taking things too far—continues. My issue is that the Labor government wants to give the minister the keys to the bank. They want to give the minister all the power to ban other payment mechanisms for online gambling whenever the minister wants, by way of a legislative instrument. This is giving way too much power to one person. In line with our democratic system, one person should not have all the power to make decisions such as this.

I would like to see part of this bill being reworked and a call for any future proposed bans to return to parliament to allow for bipartisan support. While we all probably think we're right a lot of the time, one person does not have the ability to see every point of view or see every option. So, for this policy to be as beneficial for all the Australian people as possible, we need the thoughts and ideas of multiple people to be considered. This bill is a positive step forward in our responsibility and in our jobs to adopt sensible policies that remove and reduce harm to the people of Australia.

With the cost of living skyrocketing, interest rates being higher than ever and families struggling to pay their mortgages or put food on their tables, the Australian people don't need the burden of insurmountable gambling debts hanging over their heads, threatening their future with their mortgages. This bill doesn't take away our ability to have a good time. This bill is actually preserving our way of life and our ability to have a good time responsibly and within our means. With this Labor-created cost-of-living crisis that Australians are living in at this particular point in time, we cannot afford to have our most vulnerable spending money outside of our needs.

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