Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Ban on Gambling Advertisements During Live Sport) Bill 2023, and, in doing so, I welcome the opposition joining the calls for more restrictions and a better framework for gambling and the management of gambling in this country. Let me be really clear: gambling is insidious. It ruins lives. It ruins sport. And it should have no place on our television screens or on our children's devices. Let's be frank here: the entire business model of the gambling industry is to make profit out of people's addiction and suffering. We're a modern country. We know the health impacts. We know the mental health impacts. We know the social impacts. Review after review after review and inquiry after inquiry after inquiry have shown what it is that parliaments, politicians, ministers and governments need to do. We've got to ban all advertising of gambling. We should be cleaning up the insidious addiction pushed by pokie machines. We should be restricting and stopping the insidious pushing online of gambling into our children's hands as they are on their phones or their iPads. Gambling ruins lives, and it ruins sport. Something has to be done.

Seven in 10 Australians, from recent polling, want gambling ads banned from all television—not just from an hour before to an hour after sport; they don't want it at all. Regular Australians know that the gambling industry has had it too good for too long, making profits off the back of people's suffering, addiction and mental health, and off the innocence of children. Why, in 2023, are we still debating this issue? It's because of the political clout and influence that the gambling industry holds over both major parties in this country—election donations, special dinners, mates rates, the sliding doors for advisers from the office of one minister or shadow minister into the gambling industry and back again. If you want to know why we have a gambling crisis in this country, it's because the gambling industry has had its foot on the throat of politicians for decades. It's time we stood up and said, 'Enough.'

This bill is a very, very modest bill. We need to do more than this—much more. What I am incredibly impressed with is that regular Australians know that. Whether this bill passes or not, they will know that this is not enough. Regular Australians have seen their friends, their families, their loved ones and their work colleagues suffer at the hands of this bottom-feeding industry, which is desperate for profit at any expense and is all about sucking money out of the pockets of people who don't actually have it to give. If we're going to ban advertising on broadcast, we need to be really clear that we're not going to allow it to just continue to be pushed online. It's important that we remove gambling ads from live sport, but they also need to be removed from all hours that children are watching television or accessing entertainment and content on their devices. I call on the government to do more. We've heard from the minister today that the government wants to do this and wants to do that, saying, 'We'll get to this.' Move faster. Lift your game.

Government have told us that they're waiting for the report from the House of Representatives committee. I look forward to seeing that report too, but—I can tell you what—it's going to say the same things that every report and inquiry has said for the last two decades. It's not a policy response we are missing; it is the political will to stare down this insidious industry and say, 'Enough.' It's the political will to turn their backs on their gambling industry mates. It's to have the political will to say, 'No, we will not take any more gambling donations to help us get elected.' That is what we need from either side today—not a tinkering around the edges and not pushing gambling ads from one small part of television broadcasting into the rest of broadcasting or online. We need the political will to pull the rug out from underneath the gambling industry and say enough. Stop taking our children for fools and feeding off their innocence, because that's what this industry is doing. They are feeding off the innocence of children, they are ruining lives and they're ruining sport.

The Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation reported that 148 gambling ads were broadcast between 6 pm and 8.30 pm every week night on free-to-air television. They also found that, on average, four times more gambling ads were played during sport than were played during non-sport. Children and young people were therefore considerably more exposed to gambling advertising when watching sport. When do children sit down with their families in front of the television to enjoy some family time? We increasingly know it is when their favourite team is playing.

I understand the reason the opposition have brought this bill as it is, with this focus. But if we only do this, we risk pushing this insidious cowboy industry to target children even more in the hours when they are not with their parents, when they're not sitting down with family—when there isn't a parental filter. And that, I fear, will drive even more addiction and harm. We need a comprehensive response to this, and we know what the solutions are.

We have the ludicrous situation where hundreds of millions of dollars is spent across this country responding to the health, the mental health and the social crisis driven by gambling addiction. Yet at the same time the public broadcaster SBS is allowed to run gambling ads on television between shows—a public broadcaster! The contradictions, the twisting of facts and the convenience of policy on this issue are just revolting. We need consistency. If we shouldn't be showing ads for gambling during the Adelaide Crows and Port Adelaide showdown then we shouldn't be showing ads that promote gambling at any time on a public broadcaster. We need consistency across the board here.

I call on the minister today—we've heard the promises that you'll do this, you'll do that, you'll wait for this report—I want action and I want concrete evidence that you will act, and so do the Australian people. They're sick and tired of promises from politicians that someone will do something about the insidiousness of gambling and the harm and the suffering. Then it all gets too hard. The gambling lobby come knocking on the doors of ministers and shadow ministers, and on the doors of backbenchers in the party room, saying: 'If you do this we won't be able to donate to that campaign. Don't you remember when you came to that dinner?' Stare these buggers down! They have no place—