By MICHELLE HERBISON
The Coalition’s proposal for an industry advisory group on gaming policy reform is a “huge kick in the guts” to those struggling with problem gambling, according to a local Greens member.
Senator Richard Di Natale said the Coalition’s plan to include on its advisory group industry members but no academics, anti-gambling advocates or problem gamblers would fail to solve gambling issues in the community.
“The Coalition has said to the pokies industry, ‘You can write the policy on problem gambling’. If you were a problem gambler, you’d feel betrayed by the Coalition.
“They’ve basically said, ‘We don’t care about you, we don’t care if someone in your family gambled away your family’s life savings, we don’t care if you dad or mum’s got a problem with gambling and can’t feed you.
“They only care about keeping the industry happy.”
Mr Di Natale said the government should impose $1 bet limits on poker machines to curb the $5 billion revenue the industry gained a year from problem gamblers.
“The fact is 40 per cent of the industry’s revenue comes from problem gamblers. We’ve got to be prepared to say that’s not acceptable.
“It’s fair to say the industry might lose a small amount of revenue but we’ve got to make a call.”
Australian Hotels Association Victorian Vice-President and Geelong’s Lord of the Isles Tavern owner Peter Burnett praised the Coalition for recognising gaming policy was “best handled at state level”.
“The reason why Julia Gillard took up anti-gambling was because she wanted to form government and did a deal with Andrew Wilkie. We don’t believe mandatory pre-commitment is the answer.
“To bring in a Federal Government body to oversee each state wasn’t going to work from day one.”
Mr Burnett said Victoria was “ahead of the pack” with current advertising bans and mandatory staff training and voluntary pre-commitment to be introduced in 2015.
Mr Burnett said individuals deserved choice and should be responsible for their own actions.
“The Greens have got to show a bit of common sense. Look at how many people we employ and how much we give back to the community.”
