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

I rise today in favour of the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Ban Gambling Ads) Bill 2024, the Australian Greens' bill which will implement a comprehensive ban on all forms of online gambling advertising across television, radio, online and print media. This ban is an idea that is essentially needed and is endlessly popular with the community. It was agreed to by all sides of the political spectrum in the parliamentary inquiry led by the late Peta Murphy, yet the Albanese government seems to be crab walking away. This is an opportunity for the Albanese government to implement their promise made to the Australian people, to families, for a ban on gambling advertising that is harmful and damaging to our community.

Almost two years have passed since the Murphy inquiry, and, despite many promises made, the government has nothing to show for it. A gambling ads ban is the unfinished business of this parliament. While the clock is ticking, we haven't run out of time to get it done quite yet, and I am hopeful that common sense will prevail. I am hopeful that, over the next week and a half, this parliament, this government, will show the strength and courage to do the right thing and ban gambling advertising before the election—as you promised.

Last week, I wrote to Minister Rowland to offer a pragmatic pathway to take a sensible step forward and said we would support legislation this fortnight that will ban gambling ads online and implement broadcast restrictions before and after sport during the times when kids are watching. The offer we made is consistent, I might say, with what the Albanese government's promises have previously been. It is a step towards implementing the recommendations of the Murphy review and, most importantly, it is a step towards protecting our kids and our community from gambling harm. I hope that in the next week and a half, during what is seemingly the final sitting fortnight before the election, the Prime Minister and members of his government will prioritise the interests of the community over the interests of the gambling lobby and those making money off this parasitic and dangerous industry.

On Monday this week, it was revealed that the Labor Party had received $188,000 and the Liberal Party $167,000 from the gambling lobby just in this last financial year alone. No wonder there isn't a will to ban gambling ads. You do wonder why Australian families and the community are being sold out for such a low price. For a few hundred thousand dollars, it seems all courage and all promises have been put aside for the sake of keeping the gambling industry happy.

I hope I'm wrong. This is an opportunity for the Prime Minister and his government to show some strength. Last year, the Prime Minister cleared his schedule for a day to meet with the gambling lobby and the sports code CEOs back to back. We know that because it's been revealed via FOI. Since then, the government has been totally silent on any sort of plan to address gambling advertising—even a phase-out or a partial ban. They're being so secretive that they have even since refused to release the details of the Minister for Sport's meetings with relevant stakeholders. Yet we are told by the communications minister that they're still busy, two years on, consulting. 'Consulting', it seems, is code for 'cave-in'.

This proves where the Labor government's true loyalties lie: with the cashed up gambling lobby, the big media companies and the big corporate sporting codes. We need leaders in this place. We need leaders in this place who are willing to show the strength of character needed to ban these gambling ads, because they are harming our families. They are harmful for our children. They are harmful for our economy. They are harmful for Australians. Australians are losing more than $32 billion per year, the highest per capita loss in the world, to gambling. That makes us the biggest gambling losers in the entire world, and someone's making a lot of money out of this. A lot of families are being ruined and a lot of small businesses are losing cash, but the big corporates in the gambling lobby are making a motza. Who do you stand with? Do you stand with the gambling lobby, or do you stand with Australian families?

Advertising this insidious industry only fuels these losses. It normalises the practice of gambling across our screens and our devices. In just one year, one million gambling ads were aired on free-to-air television and radio—a million gambling ads bombarding Australians in their homes and in their workplaces. And that's not to mention the huge rise in targeted ads across social media and online platforms. Kids are being targeted directly. Young people are being targeted with gambling advertising on their social media feeds or while they are watching Bluey on YouTube. Children are being bombarded with ads for gambling when they're listening to their favourite pop stars on Spotify. Kids are being bombarded with gambling ads every time they log on to check out the scores of their favourite sports stars. Our kids are being fed straight into the hands of these gambling parasites. We have to put a stop to it. People are sick of having gambling ads rammed down their throats, and parents are sick of seeing them being portrayed directly in front of their kids' eyes.

Australians love sport. We're a sporting nation, and yet it is not possible to follow these important cultural events any more without being assaulted by ads, odds or betting commentary. We teach our kids to back the family team and your favourite player because of the spirit of team sport, not because it may or may not be trading well on the betting market.

These ads and inducements fuel addiction. They cause devastating social harm, not just a financial loss but health and mental health issues, family violence and break-ups. And, sadly, for far too many families, it has led to suicide. Young people are particularly vulnerable, and gambling companies prey on this vulnerability, reaching children through their social media and grooming them to be gamblers. Research has shown that up to one-third of young people may be gambling before the age of 18. Who in this place thinks that that is okay? I don't believe any of you on any side think that that is okay, but you've got to have the guts to do something about it.

The harm that this causes the Australian community is a national social and health crisis, and it needs to be treated as such. This is what we did with tobacco advertising. We banned tobacco advertising because we knew it was the promotion of a dangerous and harmful product. Gambling is dangerous and harmful, so the promotion of it without regulation online, a free-for-all on our kids' and young people's social media feeds, on catch-up TV or on our free-to-air televisions should be banned.

I want to say that this bill is not about banning gambling itself. No-one is actually suggesting that. The bed-wetters on the government benches suggest that we can't have reform because people just want to ban gambling. That is dishonest. It is not true, and they know it. This is about banning the promotion of a harmful product, protecting our kids from being bombarded by those within the industry who want to prey on their vulnerability. It is time to protect our kids from the gambling groomers.

This bill is the full implementation of the Peta Murphy report. The experts back it; the health experts back it; the gambling advocates back it. In fact, two years ago, members of both the Labor and Liberal parties backed it. What happened then? The vested interests got in the ear of the leadership—of the Prime Minister and the ministers. The Deputy Prime Minister has succumbed to the pressure of the gambling lobby to go weak and to water over banning these ads. It's time to show some courage. It's time to show some real leadership.

I've offered a compromise to the government. If you can't bring yourselves to do what you said you would do or what the late Peta Murphy pleaded for this parliament to do, at least do some of it. Look at the damage that is being done online to our kids and families and to the young men who are being overwhelmingly targeted by these groomers in the gambling industry. Take them on! We have a week and a half left of this session of parliament. Let's do something that goes, at least in some way, towards meeting the necessary needs in the community of limiting the harm that gambling is doing. Let's come some way towards meeting the promises that you made to the Australian people. We could leave this place at the end of next week knowing we've protected kids and young people from the harms of the gambling industry and their insidious ads online if you've got the political will to do it. If you don't, my question is: does Peter Dutton?