Nick Xenophon (SA, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Hansard source

I move Nick Xenophon Team amendment (24) on sheet 8038:

(24) Schedule 1, page 36 (after line 19), after item 143, insert:

143A After section 69A

Insert:

69B Minister must mandate blocking illegal overseas gambling websites

The Minister must, within 6 months after the commencement of this section, make a legislative instrument requiring internet service providers to block access to illegal overseas gambling websites.

I excised this amendment because of a request from the Australian Greens, and I respect that request. This amendment says that the minister must within six months after the commencement of this section make a legislative instrument requiring internet service providers to block access to illegal overseas gambling websites. This is something that I know is contentious, but if you want this to work it can work.

We know from just one company, Netsweeper of Canada, that I met with and that have given submissions to inquiries in relation to this that you can have internet content filtering categorisation, web threat management solutions and services that allow organisations to manage internet access and activity. This can be used for gambling. This can be used to ensure that these illegal overseas online gambling sites cannot be easily accessed. Netsweeper is not 100 per cent perfect, but my understanding is that it ends up filtering well over 95 per cent of these sites. It makes it very difficult for these sites to be accessed. We know from the Australian Bankers Association that they can track the merchant numbers, or they have a pretty good idea of what the merchant numbers are, of these unauthorised online casinos. We do not know exactly how much is lost to these casinos, but it is in the hundreds of millions of dollars. If we are going to be fair dinkum about tackling illegal online casinos this is the way to do it. This has merit and will be effective.

It is enough of a battle to deal with the legal online bookmakers here in Australia, with sports betting and the damage that causes, but it is really the wild west when it comes to these unauthorised online casinos from overseas. I have had constituents and Senator Kakoschke-Moore has worked with constituents who have been devastated by losses to companies that are based in Malta, Gibraltar or the Caribbean. I commend this amendment as a means of requiring the government to seriously tackle this by ensuring that we use available technologies to block these sites.

Question negatived.