Joy gets her gaming laws through. Pokies dens get what they want.

Masquara said :

How did the Greens vote? Wouldn’t they have needed Greens support to get this up?

I was trying to work that out myself.

Surely the Greens would vote no on moral grounds, and the Libs would vote no because the changes will financially benefit Labor?

Having read through the comments, the only surprising thing to me is that people are still surprised that ACT Labor is pushing through self serving policies with nary a thought to the social consequences.

Urgent Coffee required! Wake up and smell time please!

What about the fact that in the last decade ACT Labor has engineered a situation whereby the ACT has gone from one of the most affordable to the least affordable cities in Australia to buy a house? The social consequences have been profound – the old (relatively egalitarian) Canberra is gone and in its place we have a real estate agent and land developer haven built and paid for from the pockets of the working poor. The pokies policy is entirely consistent with the ACT Labor housing policy and therefore utterly unsurprising to me.

How did the Greens vote? Wouldn’t they have needed Greens support to get this up?

p1 said :

chewy14 said :

I don’t see anything in that legislation that’s particularly bad. In fact it looks like sensible regulation of the industry.

It just seems to me that there is very little in this announcement to benefit the community (if you believe that pokies are generally “bad” for the community). On the other hand, most of these things are good for the people who own and operate the pokies.

Alcohol and tobacco are also pretty heavily regulated. I see this announcement as the same as if Joy put out a release announcing that you no longer needed to check IDs before selling fags, or reducing RSA to “if they can stand up un-aided they can keep drinking…”.

[ok, so I exaggerated a little….]

I’m not sure you have exagerated.

Minister Burch has a vested interest in maximising the take from pokies, both from a Labor Club and Govco interest.

ACT Labor seem to have no interest in dispelling conflict of interest appearances from owning the pokie palaces, and receiving income from this source.

There is a clear conflict of interest, and it should probably be investigated by a Federal body.

p1 said :

Alcohol and tobacco are also pretty heavily regulated. I see this announcement as the same as if Joy put out a release announcing that you no longer needed to check IDs before selling fags, or reducing RSA to “if they can stand up un-aided they can keep drinking…”.

[ok, so I exaggerated a little….]

If you wonder around civic after midnight on a Friday or Saturday you will find that this is pretty much the way things operate now anyways.

p1 said :

reducing RSA to “if they can stand up un-aided they can keep drinking…”.

I’m fully supportive of your policy aims.

Jim Jones said :

chewy14 said :

colourful sydney racing identity said :

chewy14 said :

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I support harm minimisation in both arenas

So smashing the pokies and banning ATM’s is part of your detailed harm minimisation strategy?

Smashing pokies is the most effective (and enjoyable) harm minimisation strategy I can think of.

Actually that would be pretty fun. But maybe that’s just because I like breaking stuff.

p1 said :

….Alcohol and tobacco are also pretty heavily regulated. I see this announcement as the same as if Joy put out a release announcing that you no longer needed to check IDs before selling fags, or reducing RSA to “if they can stand up un-aided they can keep drinking…”.

[ok, so I exaggerated a little….]

Ah, I think you’ll find these are termed ‘important reforms’….. 😉
(I love how everything is a ‘reform’ nowadays!)

chewy14 said :

I don’t see anything in that legislation that’s particularly bad. In fact it looks like sensible regulation of the industry.

It just seems to me that there is very little in this announcement to benefit the community (if you believe that pokies are generally “bad” for the community). On the other hand, most of these things are good for the people who own and operate the pokies.

Alcohol and tobacco are also pretty heavily regulated. I see this announcement as the same as if Joy put out a release announcing that you no longer needed to check IDs before selling fags, or reducing RSA to “if they can stand up un-aided they can keep drinking…”.

[ok, so I exaggerated a little….]

chewy14 said :

colourful sydney racing identity said :

chewy14 said :

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I support harm minimisation in both arenas

So smashing the pokies and banning ATM’s is part of your detailed harm minimisation strategy?

the former was a flippant comment, the latter, yes, yes it is.

chewy14 said :

colourful sydney racing identity said :

chewy14 said :

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I support harm minimisation in both arenas

So smashing the pokies and banning ATM’s is part of your detailed harm minimisation strategy?

Smashing pokies is the most effective (and enjoyable) harm minimisation strategy I can think of.

colourful sydney racing identity said :

chewy14 said :

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I support harm minimisation in both arenas

So smashing the pokies and banning ATM’s is part of your detailed harm minimisation strategy?

chewy14 said :

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I don’t see anything in that legislation that’s particularly bad. In fact it looks like sensible regulation of the industry.

People who dislike poker machines should be lobbying for the clubs to give more money back to the community and for supporting problem gamblers.

The whole point of legalising vices is so that they can be properly regulated and not operate in a black market. I would wager most people don’t want to see a total ban, but a strongly regulated legalised system.

Things like limiting ATM cash withdrawals from gaming venues make complete sense.

chewy14 said :

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I support harm minimisation in both arenas

I find it mildly amusing that some of the people who can be supportive of personal freedoms in areas such as drug taking are so negative when it comes to the issue of poker machines.

I don’t see anything in that legislation that’s particularly bad. In fact it looks like sensible regulation of the industry.

People who dislike poker machines should be lobbying for the clubs to give more money back to the community and for supporting problem gamblers.

p1 said :

colourful sydney racing identity said :

Mordd said :

Fairly shocked by the ATM rules change, why are we making it easier for people to gamble large amounts of money in short periods of time again?

Agreed. I would like to see a ban on ATMs, or taking cash out on premises that contain pokies.

I think a flat ban is a bit harsh. Clubs are places where you tend to make several small transaction over the course of a night – cash is ideal. However, even with the current cost of food an drinks in our clubs (I won’t comment on quality), if $250 isn’t enough for you to have a three course meal, get blind drunk and still have enough change to satisfy your desire to gamble, then you have a gambling problem.

you could always take cash with you…

Gigantor said :

I’m curious where this ‘pool of up to 150 machines’ will come from, as I wouldn’t have thought there would be alot of surrendering of machines in the club industry. I thought clubs were more into getting as many as possible not giving the pokies back.

The Aristocrat factory?

I’m curious where this ‘pool of up to 150 machines’ will come from, as I wouldn’t have thought there would be alot of surrendering of machines in the club industry. I thought clubs were more into getting as many as possible not giving the pokies back.

Possibly another polarisng issue to vote on later in the year then?
What do the Libs think? Did they vote against the bill?

colourful sydney racing identity said :

Mordd said :

Fairly shocked by the ATM rules change, why are we making it easier for people to gamble large amounts of money in short periods of time again?

Agreed. I would like to see a ban on ATMs, or taking cash out on premises that contain pokies.

I think a flat ban is a bit harsh. Clubs are places where you tend to make several small transaction over the course of a night – cash is ideal. However, even with the current cost of food an drinks in our clubs (I won’t comment on quality), if $250 isn’t enough for you to have a three course meal, get blind drunk and still have enough change to satisfy your desire to gamble, then you have a gambling problem.

Mordd said :

Fairly shocked by the ATM rules change, why are we making it easier for people to gamble large amounts of money in short periods of time again?

Agreed. I would like to see a ban on ATMs, or taking cash out on premises that contain pokies.

….. It’s not like they try and hide it. The clubs are clearly named “The Canberra Labor Club” for a reason.

Mordd said :

Fairly shocked by the ATM rules change, why are we making it easier for people to gamble large amounts of money in short periods of time again?

because, as labour and the clubs act will tell you, its not the poker machines or the clubs that are the problem, its the gamblers. Not the clubs fault if a punter wants to put his kids food money into the poker machines. Gamblers need to be educated, not stopped. clubs are good people and they dont mean to make a living off other familys misery, and its totally ok for children to go hungry as long as their parents are getting educated!

Or, of course, the labour party benefits greatly by people being aloowed to blow as much money on poker machines as possible.

Fairly shocked by the ATM rules change, why are we making it easier for people to gamble large amounts of money in short periods of time again?

On the upside, I’m enjoying the irony of this architect of misery being named “Joy”.

Jim Jones said :

This is the kind of evil s*** that people should be calling Labor out on.

Revolting.

+1

This is the kind of evil s*** that people should be calling Labor out on.

Revolting.

What conflict of interest?

Absolutely disgusting.

Labour is supposed to be about *the working familys*, yet they are one of the main cuases of complete family break down and poverty withing the blue collar community.

Poker machines should be completely banned. Instead labour will keep being funded by the destruction of entire familys.

Nice work, burch.

Next in the news – “opium poppie plantation etablished inside AMC”

– Amend the $250 daily Automatic Teller Machine (ATM) withdrawal limit proposed in the first draft of the Bill so that it no longer apply to ATMs sites operating 20 or fewer machines, or those only operating ‘Class B’ machines (typically pubs and taverns).

Is it just me, or is the only reason for this change to attract more high rollers problem gamblers to smaller clubs dens of sadness?

disgraceful. smash the pokies.

Your title says it all.

Good on ALP paving the way for the clubs – Labor Club included (if not first and foremost) – to start shifting their cursed pokies out to Gungahlin. Good to see they don’t let anything trifling like community interest get in the way of their support of the so-called “clubs” and their gambling addiction.

And they’ll now be able to sell the block of land over the street from the two churches and the mosque to the highest club bidder, like they’ve been so desperate to do for the last two years.

Gungahlin does not need more pokies. Nor does it want them.

wow… one would almost expect that labor has some sort of vested interest in facilitating problem gamblers… one might go so far as to think that perhaps labor gets a substantial amount of its funding from gambling….

everyone knows that hypocrisy is an inescapable element of politics but really, this is a bit despicable.

Mrs Burch – enabler.

Nothing in that is good for the community. Even the cap isn’t, because it increases on a per capita basis. For every 92 people, there is another machine.

So the new Wright Labor Club, with 20 machines, has it’s ATM programmed to cough up any ammount the punter wishes ($2-3K anyone), and it will be perfectly legal, because ‘the Club has to establish’.

This is B*#^@t. Given the interest in reducing the numbers of problem gambling punters, what on earth is this wretched Polly doing but making it even easier to blow the bank.

Ms Burch. You have done this City a diservice!