- The Guardian
- Issue #2202
Image: rawpixel.com
After more than 1,000 days of silence, the federal government has finally responded to the recommendations to the Murphy Report into online gambling.
Typically, rather than implement the Murphy report, the Albanese government has tried to have a bit both ways by banning some but not all gambling advertisements and leaving inducements untouched.
Martin Thomas, CEO of the Alliance for Gambling Reform says it seemed the government saw this issue as too difficult and too sensitive, given the powerful interests involved.
The Prime Minister acknowledged that Australia needed to do more to stop children being exposed to gambling ads and to break the nexus between betting and sport, but he went on to leave children exposed to three gambling ads per hour.
“Can you imagine allowing three cigarette ads every hour?” asks Thomas.
The government also did not ban inducements. Lurid stories of high-value gamblers being offered drugs, escorts, and travel abound in the media at the moment. A less spectacular but more widespread issue is potentially thousands of problem gamblers are encouraged to keep coming back with incentives such as free bets.
Australians are literally the biggest gambling losers in the world. Thomas says this is not because Aussies like a punt more than people in other countries, but because we have “some of the weakest legal protections and some of the weakest enforcement.”
