Gerard Rennick (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the cashless debit card. I want to touch on the scourge of addiction. I know that there's been a lot of discussion about other issues and other areas, but I think that one of the strengths of the cashless debit card is to enable or help people get off their addiction, whatever that may be, whether it's drinking, gambling or drugs.

I was talking to a pastor at Hervey Bay who works with food banks and he said that when the cashless debit card was introduced up at Hervey Bay—thanks to the hard work of the member for Hinkler, Keith Pitt—that the length of the food lines dropped dramatically, and that the feedback he was getting was that a lot of people who were previously addicted basically had no other choice but to get off whatever their addiction was, and that food was being put on the table, which was a pleasant change for many families.

This has been touched on a lot, and there's some merit in the idea of making the card voluntary, but the problem is that you try telling that to an addict and they just won't go down the path of choosing self-control. They'll always take the cash because obviously a lot of things like drugs, for example, are only traded on the black market, so they need cash.

I will point out that I've always had a big issue with the Labor party and gambling in my home state of Queensland. I grew up in the small town of Chinchilla in the 1970s and eighties. At the time it was only a small town of 3,000 people. It's now almost 8,000 people, so it's much much bigger than it was. I grew up when my hometown had a maternity ward but we didn't have poker machines. When the Goss Labor government got in in the early nineties the first thing they did was introduce poker machines into the state and then proceeded to sell all of our infrastructure. So now my hometown has basically lost its maternity ward, it's lost its councils, the roads out there continue to deteriorate, and it's basically being left behind. The Labor politicians, certainly from my home state, should reflect on the scourge of gambling and poker machines that have been introduced into the state of Queensland and if they themselves—because they're not in the state government—can't repeal those poker machines, maybe the least that they can do to try to reduce the scourge of gambling with poker machines by reflecting on whether or not this cashless debit card would help reduce the number of people who are addicted to gambling in pubs. As someone who enjoyed a pint quite a lot in my early days, I can't tell you how much I hate a pub full of poker machines. It just kills the atmosphere greatly.

I'll keep my remarks very brief but I do think there's a lot of merit in keeping the cashless debit card. I don't think it's a question of being punitive for the sake of punitive or anything like that. I think it's got the best of intentions, ultimately.

The other thing is that, when you are addicted, it is very hard if you're spending time on drugs, at the pub drinking or with the gambling machine. You're less inclined to go and look for work; whereas, if you suddenly have your cash pulled away from you, you might go: 'Well, I actually might have to get a job to get some cash so I can continue to do whatever I want to do.'

Obviously, I think that the benefits outweigh any downside with this card, and I thoroughly would urge those on the other side to reflect on the potential damage that the repeal of the cashless debit card could cause, not just in Indigenous communities but in poorer communities across Australia, especially in regional towns. I'll conclude with that, but I will foreshadow the second reading amendment on sheet 1665 in Senator Ruston's name, as circulated in the chamber.