Milton Dick (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today's bill, the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Lottery Betting) Bill 2018, enables me to place on record the issue around synthetic lotteries. As I was saying in my earlier remarks, this only allows customers to bet on the outcome of a lottery draw without the need to purchase a ticket in the official lottery draw. Unlike official lottery draws, ticket sales do not cover major payouts. Instead, these are covered by insurance policies. A contingency would include the drawing of a particular number in a particular position or in a particular sequence.

We know that in recent times, on a state and territory level, governments have been clamping down on synthetic lotteries. These include the Northern Territory government, who introduced a prohibition on betting on the outcome of Australian lotteries. This was a welcome step, but it has not gone far enough to address some of the raised concerns. Elsewhere, South Australia does not permit lottery betting services, and it appears that this has been effective in stopping these services being provided to SA residents. The Tasmanian, Victorian, New South Wales and Western Australian governments are considering similar steps.

It's clear from these overwhelming movements by the states and territories that prohibiting lottery betting services is the right thing to do. But it's the Commonwealth that has responsibility for online gambling matters and is best placed to implement a national position in relation to lottery betting services in Australia. This would be consistent with the National Consumer Protection Framework and the new credit betting prohibition in the Interactive Gambling Act that came into effect earlier this year. The act is intended to minimise the scope of problem gambling in Australia.

Lottery draws are permitted under the IGA, as there have traditionally only been a small number of draws conducted, with some seven draws conducted across the week, typically with a day's break in between. However, lottery betting services have now allowed consumers to bet on the outcome of up to 25 lottery draws being conducted around the world each week, with the promise of massive jackpots ranging up to hundreds of millions of dollars, which could lead to problem and at-risk gambling.

Further to this, the growing disruption to traditional lotto betting services is having an increased negative impact, as we've heard in the debate today, on newsagencies and other small businesses across Australia. They rely on the commissions from the sales of official lottery tickets. Over $350 million is earnt by some 4,000 newsagencies and official lottery agents across Australia. These businesses rely on this commission to earn an income and cover the costs of running a business, which include employing thousands of staff across the country. The concern is that synthetic lottery services entice customers away from these businesses with the promise of substantially higher jackpot amounts compared to those prizes that can be offered under the official lottery draw. What results is job losses and newsagents closing their doors.

This enables me to put on record the great work of our local small business newsagents. I know that for each and every one of us, when we move around the community, often newsagents are the lifeblood and the heartbeat of local strip malls and shopping centres. They are sometimes run by local family businesses and they form a real, integral part of the local small business network.

I am also pleased to see bipartisanship on this matter, as we know just how much problem gambling we are seeing as an impact on Australian families. It's estimated that 200,000 Australians have a high-level problem with gambling, while up to twice as many more have difficulties at a lower level. There's a ripple effect where corrosive habits can impinge on friends and family. According to problem gambling experts and people from Monash University in Melbourne, we know that the numbers extend to the 650,000 Australian account holders who can gamble all too easily through their mobile phones and on synthetic lotteries like Lottoland.

In closing, I'd like to quote Tim Costello from the Alliance for Gambling Reform, who said:

Just like the way online poker companies such as Pokerstars exited the Australian market after new federal legislation last year, Lottoland should do likewise rather than further deluging Australians with more gambling messages attempting to grow the dangerous online segment.

I particularly commend the shadow minister for communications, the member for Greenway, on her leadership on this issue, which will extend to give greater protections to businesses, consumers and all Australians from falling into the trap of problem gambling.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have considered the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Lottery Betting) Bill 2018 in quite a lot of detail in terms of my support for it, because, of course, it includes lots of different measures, such as pathways that shut down the freedom of Australians to engage in some gambling activities. I do, and always will, take freedom very seriously; it's the core of who we are as a nation and the basis on which I sought election to parliament. But it's pretty hard to go past the reality of what happens in the practice of Lottoland's activities and whether those are proper within a well-regulated operation around competition, particularly in the gambling sector.

I do have challenges with parts of this bill, and I'm not trying to pretend otherwise, but when it comes down to it, we have a situation where people are using the opportunities provided through technology and the internet to subvert domestic competitive activity. Disruption, by itself, can be a very positive thing—in fact, it can be an extremely positive thing—but it still has to operate within a system of laws, taxes and regulations to make sure that consumers are not taken advantage of and that people are also meeting their responsibilities within a free society. That's the basis on which I support this legislation.

When you have a company in Australia operating, as Lottoland does, against existing providers who carry the burden and the cost of regulation and of making a contribution to our tax system, and who are obviously integral in terms of the operations of many Australian small businesses—particularly newsagents of course, many of which I have in my own electorate, as many others do; though perhaps, I imagine, not as many as some have had in the past—we have to take appropriate measures to provide pathways for those who want to compete in that space to do so in a legal way and to match those responsibilities and burdens that other providers carry. This bill seeks to do that. It essentially seeks to provide—I'm very wary of using these phrases ordinarily—a level playing field for those who seek to run lottery activities and gambling activities within Australia by ensuring they match their responsibilities by paying taxation and by being well regulated. The bill also makes sure that we have proper competition within the marketplace that enables consumers to choose but not be taken advantage of simply through the use of technology.

It's very important because sitting behind a lot of discussions around gambling are discussions around making sure we address and tackle part of the challenges of gambling addiction. One of the reasons we have tax obligations directly associated with different forms of lotteries is to make sure there's a surplus benefit out of that type of activity to support those who are most in need, and to make sure that people can't be taken advantage of where there aren't support services for people who feel they have a problem to get proper redress. This bill acknowledges that practical reality of the addiction that can occur with gambling and takes appropriate steps and pathways to make sure that we continue to provide the services for those people who are in need of assistance, particularly when it can have such a negative downward spiralling effect on people's lives. By taking such sensible measures in this piece of legislation, we're enabling a proper and well-regulated environment for gambling for Australian consumers to choose, something I believe very strongly in. We are making sure that we have an environment in which people can get the support and assistance they need to make sure that there is no chance of problem gambling turning into the consequences of a downward spiralling of people's lives.

Now, nobody is going to try and pretend that there's not an interest for government in this—there is. Of course, gambling revenue for state governments, in particular, is very important in terms of budget balance sheets. But in truth, it's largely got nothing to do with the justification for why this bill should be addressed and introduced. It's not just to stop the realities of gambling competition or disruption where it's appropriate and necessary, but it is appropriate to make sure we take legislative measures, particularly because of the challenges the technology presents us, to make sure that consumers are not taken advantage of and to make sure we have a proper and well-regulated system.

Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm on the record as an opponent of gambling in all its forms, both in my own community and in this place. My opposition began as a young man when I was re-roofing a TAB as a carpenter, many years ago. However, an extensive and powerful body of academic evidence exists which shows what a blight on our society gambling is, and for that reason I wholeheartedly support the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Lottery Betting) Bill 2018.

In relation to problem gambling, in 2017 alone, Australians lost—if you're ready for this, Mr Deputy Speaker—almost $24 billion to gambling, according to the Australian gambling statistics collated by the Queensland government. As Dr Charles Livingstone of Monash University says, gambling is a public health problem. In terms of disability-adjusted life years, the impact of gambling is approximately the same as excessive alcohol consumption. Between 80,000 and 160,000 Australian adults suffer with severe problems from gambling. This equates to somewhere between 0.5 and one per cent of adults. A further 230,000 to 350,000 Australians, or 1.5 to 2.1 per cent of adults, experience moderate risks that may make them vulnerable to problem gambling. Although small in absolute terms, this means that as many as 30 per cent of regular gamblers are problem gamblers.

Not all people who gamble have a gambling problem—I readily accept that—but, according to a 1999 Productivity Commission report, expenditures on gambling by problem gamblers constitute as much as 40 per cent of all money spent on gambling. In the case of electronic gambling machines—pokies—42 per cent of revenue comes from high-risk gamblers, with another 20 per cent from moderate-risk gamblers. This problem is highly regressive, with those on lower incomes and in disadvantaged populations much more likely to experience problem gambling and to spend a larger proportion of their income on gambling. Problem gambling works to entrench economic disadvantage and can contribute to its transmission between generations.

In 2010 and 2012, in the Northern Territory and in New South Wales, separate studies demonstrated gambling impacts on Indigenous communities and identified greater negative impacts than on the non-Indigenous population, specifically with respect to poker machines. Studies focused on individual-level harms to the gambler have found that gambling is linked with financial problems, bankruptcy, increased likelihood of divorce, substance abuse, anxiety, depression and even suicide. There are far too many studies to list, but they include Black, Shaw, McCormick and Allen's 'Marital status, childhood maltreatment, and family dysfunction: a controlled study of pathological gambling'; another study entitled 'Young adults' gambling and its association with mental health and substance use problems', published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health; and Kerber et al's 'The impact of disordered gambling among older adults', in the Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services.

Problem gambling causes harms to the individuals themselves, but it also causes harm to those around them and, importantly, to the wider community. Each high-risk gambler impacts, on average, six other people. These can include spouses, children, family, friends and employers. Each moderate-risk gambler affects three others, and even low-risk gamblers affect an average of one other person. A 2013 Swedish study by Svensson, Romild and Shepherdson published in BMC Public Health revealed that, in total, 18.2 per cent, nearly one in five, of the Swedish population reported having someone close to them who currently had or had previously experienced gambling-related problems. In that study, significant others experienced similar negative consequences and were significantly more likely, compared with the general population, to experience poor mental health, risky alcohol consumption, economic hardships and arguments with those closest to them. A 2016 Victorian study identified that postcodes with no poker machines were associated with 30 per cent fewer incidents of domestic violence-related assaults per 10,000 head of population.

Beyond those individuals immediately linked to the problem gambler, gambling has huge impacts on our community at large. These include higher levels of crime, higher unemployment levels, lower incomes, lower expenditure in non-gambling local businesses and the diversion of resources away from more productive uses. A significant number of studies reveal that a large percentage of problem gamblers admit to having committed a gambling-related illegal offence—most commonly, theft, fraud, robbery, assault and breach of apprehended violence orders. These studies include 'The influence of gaming expenditure on crime rates in South Australia', which shows the contrast between areas with more and less gambling. A 2010 Victorian study examined the relationship between poker machine expenditure and various types of crimes. It found that there was a consistent, positive and significant relationship between gaming and crime rates, especially income-generating crime. Income-generating crime includes theft, fraud, breaking and entering, forgery, larceny and robbery. A further 2008 South Australian study concluded that electronic gambling machine expenditure was found to influence positively and significantly income-generating crime rates in local areas in South Australia. These studies identify that the greater the amount of money spent on gambling in a particular area, the higher that area's income-generating crime happened to be.

This is not a static problem. We know that, as the amount of gambling in a particular community increases, the amount of harm that is done to individuals and our society increases. A 2014 Australian study found that an increase in mean per capita monthly poker machine expenditure from $10 to $150 was associated with a doubling in the prevalence of gambling-related harm from nine per cent to 18 per cent in the adult population in the Northern Territory. US and Canadian studies in 1989, 2001, 2004 and 2006 found that the opening of casinos there led to a significant increase in crime, growing considerably over time.

These issues have become particularly important and widely discussed in my own community on the Sunshine Coast just in the past six months. This is because the Sunshine Coast Council, led by the mayor, along with the Labor state government, has been in active discussions with an international gambling corporation, NagaCorp, about the possibility of establishing a casino in the new SunCentral Maroochydore CBD development. I have campaigned strongly against this development, and I recently held a community meeting to discuss the plans for this casino. More than 300 people attended this event. When we took a vote at the end of the community forum, the room was unanimous in its opposition to a casino. At that casino forum, we were addressed by Dr Charles Livingstone, whom I've quoted earlier, from Monash University. We were also addressed by a previous superintendent of Queensland Police, Mr Chris Sang. Both of them gave us an understanding of the societal impacts caused by gambling, and Mr Chris Sang particularly addressed the criminal aspects that flow when a casino moves into an area.

I recently submitted a right-to-information request to both the Sunshine Coast Council and the Queensland state government to learn more about the behind-the-scenes discussions, which have been ongoing, about this dramatic expansion of gambling in my own community. I'm awaiting the outcome of these requests; however, I've already heard from the state government, telling me that the request, as it stands, is too onerous, because there are 4,600 relevant documents. I'll have more to say about that later.

In relation to this bill, both in my own community, in the electorate of Fisher, and nationwide—I am not naive enough to believe that we can wholly outlaw gambling. However, what I am seeking to do in Fisher, with respect to the casino in particular, is to prevent a huge and unwarranted expansion of the available avenues for gambling. As I've described, repeated studies show that, when you increase the amount of gambling in a community, you increase the amount of harm. That is what I want to stop by preventing a casino being built on the Sunshine Coast, and it is what this bill is seeking to stop nationally by prohibiting the new phenomenon of synthetic lotteries.

The law allows lotteries in this country, but it strictly regulates them and limits their number and frequency. There are a small number of draws in Australia, and the total jackpots available are modest by world standards. These synthetic lottery products, less than two years in existence, are a huge increase in the scale and availability of gambling opportunities for those who want to take part in lotteries. Betting on the outcomes of lotteries worldwide allows individuals to take part in 25 separate draws every week, with jackpots in the hundreds of millions of dollars. In fact, in just one US Powerball draw in 2016, synthetic lottery products in Australia gave Australians the opportunity, otherwise not available, to take part in a draw for $2.3 billion. These products allow people to purchase the equivalent of tickets for these draws from home and on their mobile phones, as opposed to being required to go to a newsagent, for example. In 2017, Lottoland admitted that its business was generating more than $1 million a week in sales.

As we've seen, as awareness of these products grows, this hugely increased opportunity to gamble and the increased size of available prizes will inextricably link to more gambling harm. This bill is an important step, and I hope that the government will go further, in particular around gambling advertising in this country. This government should be commended for its actions last year to get gambling adverts out of live sports at times when they would be likely to be seen by children. That was a really positive outcome, and the government should be commended on it. But, as one of my constituents, Charles Hodgson, asked me on Facebook just a couple of days ago, 'What is the point of moving the betting ads from sports when they've just moved them elsewhere?' We've all seen the proliferation of gambling ads, particularly around our news times. I hope that this year we'll see action to prohibit sports gambling advertising on television entirely. We did it for smoking. I don't see why we can't do it for live sports betting.

In conclusion, in my electorate of Fisher, I will fight to stop the construction of a casino, because I know that, when you increase the amount and scale of the opportunities to gamble in a community, you increase the harm caused. I support this bill, and I commend it to the House.

Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank all those in the chamber who've contributed to the debate on the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Lottery Betting) Bill 2018. The Australian government is committed to ensuring that online gambling takes place under a robust legislative framework with strong consumer protections and within the boundaries of community standards. Traditional lotteries and keno games are popular and longstanding recreational gambling products that provide millions of dollars in tax revenue to every state and territory in Australia and help fund important services and infrastructure for the community, such as hospitals, schools, public transport and roads.

The intent of the Interactive Gambling Act is to minimise the scope of problem gambling in Australia by limiting the types of interactive gambling services available to Australians. The Commonwealth is responsible for online gambling matters and is best placed to implement a national position in relation to lottery betting services in Australia. This is consistent with the important work being done to establish the national consumer protection framework. Whilst some stakeholders have raised concerns that this legislation could mean that only one lottery operator would remain in Australia, the fact is that these are matters upon which the Commonwealth does not have a view. State and territory governments, not the Commonwealth, are responsible for issuing gambling licences. State and territory governments determine the number and type of licences issued and the activities that can be undertaken. The Commonwealth's responsibility is limited to online gambling activities. The Commonwealth government, the Turnbull government, has formed the view that online synthetic lotteries and keno, which involve betting on the outcome of both foreign and domestic lottery and keno draws, are a gambling bridge too far.

Traditional lotteries are built on guaranteed prize pools from ticket sales and are required to comply with strict audit and consumer protection measures. Unlike official lotteries, lottery betting services are not required to comply with the guaranteed prize pool model. Instead, their major prizes are covered by insurance policies. This allows lottery betting services to offer bigger prizes more frequently, which further impacts on the financial benefits of traditional lotteries. Over $350 million is earned by some 4,000 newsagencies and official lottery agents across Australia from sales of traditional lottery products. Traditional keno services conducted in clubs and hotels across Australia help support community services and sporting initiatives. It is clear that a shift away from official lotteries would have a negative impact on small businesses.

Many Australians enjoy lotteries and keno as a recreational activity in the full knowledge that, win or lose, purchasing a ticket will contribute money back to the community. The government strongly believes that lottery and keno betting services undermine the longstanding community acceptance of traditional lotteries. With the number of lottery betting operators entering the Australian market increasing, it is now the time for the government to take action to minimise the adverse effects on customers and small businesses in the community. I call on all in the chamber to support the bill.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.