1 August 2012

Joy Burch announces new gaming laws

| johnboy
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Joy Burch has announced some pre-election legislating on the subject of poker machines and clubs. (Bearing in mind her Labor Party remains a major club owner):

The Government’s amendments to the Bill include provisions that would:

• Allow new or single-venue clubs to access a pool of up to 150 machines to assist them establish new venues where the Government releases land suitable for new club sites. The pool will be created by the surrender of existing machines, ensuring there is no net growth in the number of machines.

• Amend the $250 daily Automatic Teller Machine (ATM) withdrawal limit proposed in the original Bill so that it no longer apply to ATMs at the Canberra Race Club temporarily brought in for race days, venues operating 10 or fewer machines, or those only operating ‘Class B’ machines (typically pubs and taverns).

• Give more flexibility to multi-venue club groups to relocate machines between venues, by allowing the relocation of up to 10 machines or 10 per cent of the existing number of machines at the receiving club – whichever is the lesser – without automatically being required to undertake a social impact assessment. Rather, the requirement for a social impact assessment would at the discretion of the Gaming and Racing Commission.

• Allow gaming machine licensees to take up to 10 per cent of their machines ‘off the floor’ for a 12 month period. At present, clubs must keep all their machines operating, whether or not they are being fully utilised.

• The Bill’s proposed introduction of a 4000 target for the number of gaming machines in the ACT remains. However once reached, a cap would be set on a per capita basis, allowing for future growth in the ACT’s population.

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Canberra-raised journo Jonathan Green has this to say about pokie demographics on the Drum:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-08-02/green-broke-and-betrayed/4170226

Jim Jones said :

chewy14 said :

I don’t think many parties would ever run a campaign on limiting individual freedoms and I wouldn’t vote for them if they did.

And yet we have restrictions on the sale of firearms, alcohol and drugs; forcing people to wear seatbelts, bike helmets, speed and age restrictions on driving; restrictions on buying and selling damn near everything that can be bought and sold … and so on ad nauseum.

Aren’t these all ‘limiting individual freedoms’?

Firstly, poker machines are already pretty restricted so it’s not a free for all. Clubs have to offer help for problem gambling and give a percentage of their earnings to community organisations and pay tax. If you want to argue that they should be doing more or paying more for the community cost of them, then I’d probably agree with you. Banning or further restricting their use, then I wouldn’t.

Johnboy’s suggestion of a higher payback to players is a good compromise.

With respect to your examples, guns and cars can directly harm other people which is why we restrict them so heavily – poker machines can’t directly hurt anyone.

I’d be all for legalising and taxing drugs. Alcohol already is.

I’d be happy to not have seatbelt and bike helmet legislation.

Yup, nanny state …..unless you own the pokie machines which fund the party running the nanny state.

Jim Jones said :

And yet we have restrictions on the sale of firearms, alcohol and drugs; forcing people to wear seatbelts, bike helmets, speed and age restrictions on driving; restrictions on buying and selling damn near everything that can be bought and sold … and so on ad nauseum.

Aren’t these all ‘limiting individual freedoms’?

Don’t forget free plastic bags!!!!!111!!11!1!!!eleventyone!!!

Gungahlin Al1:11 pm 02 Aug 12

Disgusted by this. You can’t tell me this isn’t about smoothing the way for shifting a stack of pokies out to Gungahlin. And for paving the way to sell that block of land in the Gungahlin town centre (over the street from the mosque site and two other churches) to build a new “club” – most likely to the Labor club or one of the other big chains that has been lobbying for so long to get their hands into Gungahlin wallets.
They may be eyeing off the relatively high household incomes, and thinking that Gungahlin society can handle more gambling. But the reality is tht the extremely high cost of new housing has locked many people in our area into severe mortgage stress. More pokies in Gungahlin will equate to more people going under. Simple as that.
They aren’t needed in Gungahlin, they aren’t wanted by residents. Only the clubs and the ALP are clamouring for this.
“Responding to feedback from ClubsACT” says Burch’s media release. Dead right. By rolling over and doing everything they want.
Endrey is spot on in #7.

Jim Jones said :

And yet we have restrictions on the sale of firearms, alcohol and drugs; forcing people to wear seatbelts, bike helmets, speed and age restrictions on driving; restrictions on buying and selling damn near everything that can be bought and sold … and so on ad nauseum.

Don’t forget the shopping bag restrictions……

chewy14 said :

I don’t think many parties would ever run a campaign on limiting individual freedoms and I wouldn’t vote for them if they did.

And yet we have restrictions on the sale of firearms, alcohol and drugs; forcing people to wear seatbelts, bike helmets, speed and age restrictions on driving; restrictions on buying and selling damn near everything that can be bought and sold … and so on ad nauseum.

Aren’t these all ‘limiting individual freedoms’?

johnboy said :

I think if we forced the clubs to play a fair game, say return 98c in the dollar like the betting agencies, we’d see a very different approach to pokies taken by clubs.

Yeah I think something like that makes sense. It would make it a lot harder to lose the massive amounts of cash some people currently do.

So when exactly can I play a game of Poker at my local as opposed o heading to Eagle Hawk or *gulp* Queanbeyan?

This place does my head in sometimes…

johnboy said :

I think if we forced the clubs to play a fair game, say return 98c in the dollar like the betting agencies, we’d see a very different approach to pokies taken by clubs.

+1. Roulette at the casino is a much better game then teh pokie at your local.

Show some real leadership Burch and cut the pokies in this town back by half.

In fact the same should be said for the libs and greens.

Let’s see if anyone has the balls to run to the election promising a massive cut in pokies in the ACT.

Somehow I doubt it.

I don’t think many parties would ever run a campaign on limiting individual freedoms and I wouldn’t vote for them if they did.

If people want to entertain themselves by playing pokies then i’ve got no problem with it.

As long as the clubs are forced to provide large amounts of help for problem gamblers and pay for the community cost of having them then go for it.

I think if we forced the clubs to play a fair game, say return 98c in the dollar like the betting agencies, we’d see a very different approach to pokies taken by clubs.

Let’s see if anyone has the balls to run to the election promising a massive cut in pokies in the ACT.

What is the Pirate Parties policy on pokies. Pirates, generally, are in support of raping and pillaging, but since the party owns no pokies, they might be against this particular form of plunder.

Deref said :

“Gambling”. The word you’re looking for is “gambling”.

To quote the OED on the word gamble:

As the word is (at least in serious use) essentially a term of reproach, it would not ordinarily be applied to the action of playing for stakes of trifling amount, except by those who condemn playing for money altogether.

So gaming is the action of playing at games of chance for stakes and gambling is doing it for for unduly high stakes.

I have worked in and around clubs for many years, and at one stage I did a brief stint at a company that sells and maintains poker machines.

I have seen the tallies from the machines, of how much money is put through them. I can tell you that the numbers are, quite frankly, staggering. I would estimate that it would be roughly $1.5m per machine, per year, possibly higher. Even given that each machine must (in theory) return 87.5% I think it is, that’s still a hell of a lot of money. Can you see why the clubs scream blue murder every time someone suggests tighter controls on poker machines?

Apparently Joy Burch is “pleased with the sectors willingness to tackle problem gambling”. Where was that willingness when the mandatory pre-commitment trial was being dicussed, and the clubs were plastered with posters calling the idea “un-Australian”.

I don’t think that the social impact of poker machines can be understated. Any thing that is sucking that much money out of people can’t be good. Personally I wouldn’t care if they were banned altogether, but each to their own I suppose.

Social impact assessments – wow. Could we see how the target of 4000 passed one of these?

I want to live in a community.

The ALP have never heard a reason for more poker machines (and more money from the Labor Clubs into the ALP pocket) that they couldnt believe.

Its like a beaten hooker justifying her pimps actions.

johnboy said :

It’s been gaming in government parlance for decades

Doesn’t stop it from being incorrect and misleading.

The government gazette is definitive

“Gambling”. The word you’re looking for is “gambling”.

It’s been gaming in government parlance for decades

Brazen, isn’t it? Only a few months after Labor’s plans for a poker machine “limit the damage” trial in this very town. Labor Club plans to move machines without a social impact statement – that’s indefensible. Joy Burch describes the planned legislation as “flexible support for the clubs industry”. What Joy Burch means is that she plans to help clubs that wish to identify emerging socially disadvantaged areas where they can empty more pockets (and starve more families). They’ll simply move more machines there, and away from areas that are becoming more affluent, and thereby housing fewer people who are vulnerable to Labor’s vulture clubs. Er, what exactly are those “Labor values” that were touted recently?
And why would you remove the $250 limit specifically at venues operating ten machines or fewer? Where’s the evidence that people gambling in those smaller venues are less vulnerable to being humbugged by the clubs? That’s Joy Burch “supporting the clubs” at the expense of the socially disadvantaged.
Guess who will pick up the tab for this scandalous subsidising of the clubs? ACT ratepayers – through hungry children, a need for more emergency housing, battered spouses. Where the hell do you think the money put through those pokies comes from? Poor people’s income – NONE of which is “discretionary spending”.
Didn’t we just see an Adelaide gambling addict facing jail, pleading for exactly that ATM-limit check on problem gamblers?
This pandering to the clubs is immoral and a disgrace.

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