Dorinda Cox (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this private senator's bill, the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Ban on Gambling Advertisements During Live Sport) Bill 2023, as the Australian Greens spokesperson for sport. Sport is the fabric of our nation. It's the adrenaline from watching live sport in particular that Australians across this country love. There are 30-plus different types of live sport that you can watch at the tap of your phone. You can get live scores. You can watch the action. It's available to you all at the press of a button.

Gambling has become such an integral part of sport now. In fact, you can't even watch a game, participate in tipping competitions or even speak to people about a match or a race without them talking about the odds or 'multi' and the language that the industry uses now coming up in the conversation. It's horrendous because they have their own type of language that they use. Every ad break there is a gambling ad, unfortunately, in sport. Sports teams at every level are sponsored by gambling companies. At sporting venues, logos for gambling companies are plastered absolutely everywhere. They have just taken over the atmosphere. It was once quite pleasant to go and watch a live match. It's becoming more and more difficult to watch sport without being immersed in those ads, which come thick and fast at you. I agree that this bill goes some way to addressing that, but in fact it doesn't go far enough.

The Greens want an outright ban of gambling ads—at all times and on all platforms. This bill tinkers around the edges and it fails to take the action that's actually needed. The Greens support what the coalition are trying to do, the concept behind this bill and gambling reform, but we know that more reform is needed. It needs to be much broader than what's contained in this bill. Concerns have been raised—across the chamber by both sides and by Senator Hanson-Young, who has previously spoken—that simply banning gambling ads on broadcasts will push those ads onto radio, apps, websites and other avenues. In fact, we saw this the last time gambling ad reform happened, and this has already been highlighted.

People who mostly profit from this gambling advertising say that restricting the involvement of gambling companies will kill local sport, as gambling companies have so many partnerships with local sporting clubs and that gambling advertising revenue helps broadcasters air their local sports. It's ridiculous to say that, if we cut out gambling ads, the broadcasters can't do their job and broadcast local sports. I don't know how they're making that connection. The same was said when similar bans were put in train for tobacco. I'm happy to say that I'm a little bit young to have seen the whole spectrum of that, but it seemed ridiculous at the time that people were saying that tobacco companies aren't even allowed to sponsor or be involved in sport in the first place, and then we saw an amazing amount of reform happen.

The horrible and horrific thing that is ever present in the minds of parents—and this has been researched—is that children can now identify some of these betting companies based on their colours and their logos. The marketing strategy of these gambling companies is amazing. We didn't think it was acceptable when tobacco companies were doing this, so why do we think it's okay for gambling companies to do this?

I will give an example. A couple of years ago, in 2022, the live Brownlow Medal count was in Perth. I was in the room that night, but a whole lot of ads from Sportsbet were thrown up and there were odds for who was going to win the Brownlow that night. People were horrified and they reported it to the media. This is the one night in the AFL when all eyes are on the TV. People were watching the live medal count. In particular children were watching live their AFL star in the medal count. They were admiring them and hoping that they would win the Brownlow, which is such a prestigious award. What they saw, in fact, was Sportsbet ads being churned out at every opportunity and they were bombarded with the harmful messaging that they brought around gambling.

Senator Bilyk just mentioned that there's an inquiry report on this issue coming soon and that the government have flagged wider reform as a result of that report. I also want to be clear that this is in fact a huge opportunity. The community want to see us create change in this place and they want change. A recent survey of 3,000 AFL fans found that gambling ads was the most common concern. That was the most common thread across the survey results.

A majority of them supported an outright ban, and this again supports what the Australian Greens are calling for. We are calling for a complete ban, so I hope, when this report from the inquiry comes back—and the government have signalled that there will be wider reform—they start listening to the fans of the sports as well, and don't just think they know what they are all thinking. Governments at the state and territory level also want change. We know that the ACT Attorney-General has stated he would support a near complete ban on gambling ads. The South Australian government also called for a ban, while the New South Wales, Queensland and Tasmanian governments believe the current rules are in fact too weak. They have signalled that there needs to be change and there needs to be reform not just to their communities but also to us here in the federal parliament.

Several of my colleagues, in particular Senator Rice, who chairs the community services committee, have talked at length about the harm gambling causes—the real harm—and how addictive it is. This is a vicious industry that preys off the vulnerability of people in our communities. People have gone into debt, used their super and drained their savings because of gambling. Gambling has ruined relationships and some people have lost their homes because of their addiction to gambling. We also have the self-exclusion registers that operate across the country, and people place themselves on those as a measure of trying to end their addiction. But they have reported being targeted with matched bet offers to try and get them back into gambling, which is just horrendous. In fact, it is shameful that this is happening to Australians, where they are targeted after doing all of the work and putting themselves onto a self-exclusion register.

These gambling companies, sporting codes and broadcasters are all concerned about maintaining their profits, which is no surprise, right? They are facilitating and operating within this framework, and they actually believe the current rules are fine. It's like a 'nothing to see here, move on' type of process. We see a similar type of modus operandi from fossil fuel companies, for which I have the pleasure of being the spokesperson for the Australian Greens. It has been revealed that Australian soccer's governing body is taking cuts from bets being placed at competitions at all levels in the country, from international to local and suburban. We know there are similar deals between gambling companies and the NRL, the AFL and Cricket Australia, and some of these bodies are earning commissions of up to 17.5 per cent, totalling millions of dollars of revenue for these bodies. This means that of course they don't want reform. They don't want anything to change because they are profiting from it. It just shows how out of touch some people who directly benefit from gambling are.

The Racing NSW chief executive and ARL Commission chair has said that gambling is about entertainment, right? He said:

Just like you go to a restaurant and you buy a meal—that's entertainment. As long as you're responsible with what you're spending with that entertainment, it's no different to anything else.

I mean, seriously, how out of touch is this guy? Frankly, that statement is very offensive, and it fails to acknowledge the real harm that gambling poses to people. You don't hear about people who are addicted to gambling going to restaurants at all. They don't have any money to do that. It is an entirely different thing to compare going to a restaurant, having a meal and being responsible with someone who has an addiction to gambling. It is a real thing. The gambling industry has intentionally embedded itself deeply into sport, and it has made it difficult for people to escape and break the cycle of addiction. As I said, for someone to suggest that it's like buying a meal is disgraceful. It's absolutely disgraceful, and it's downright cruel, as far as I'm concerned, that you would prey on the vulnerability of people who have an addiction to gambling. Professor Samantha Thomas, who's a gambling and public health expert said:

Sporting organisations have such an important role to play in promoting the health and social wellbeing of our community, but they continue to have a complete blind spot when it comes to gambling, which is linked to some of our most pressing health and social problems.

I think of First Nations communities in my home state of Western Australia, and in the Northern Territory, Queensland and other places. We talk a lot about closing the gap in this place and we talk a lot about what that means in our communities. But when we think about the intergenerational trauma and vulnerability in those communities, I can tell you now that people also have those Sportsbet live-gambling apps on their phones. So it's time for this blind spot to actually be addressed and it's time for sporting codes, broadcasters and gambling companies to stop making such huge profits off the vulnerabilities of people who are just trying to enjoy sport. They're just trying to participate in it—they're trying to watch it. They're trying to engage in a social way and we're allowing that harm to creep in there.

It's time for a complete ban, in fact, on all gambling advertising. I did say that although I agree with the premise of what's in this bill, I don't think it goes far enough. We absolutely cannot afford to continue to tinker around the edges with this. We are in this place as elected members to look at these issues, to create change and to create reform. We have an opportunity to do that. We, as federal leaders, need to take that responsibility. We've already heard that the states and territories are on board. They actually want more reform; they're seeing the harm, and they're responsible for some of that harm, in their own states. But we need to do the work at this level first.