Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Now that they need the vote of the member for Denison once more, they trot out some wishy-washy legislation which will achieve nothing except that it will close down a couple of small clubs and pubs, lose a few jobs, but raise a fair bit of tax. 'Whatever it takes' is their mantra.

Every state government supports voluntary precommitment. They are already moving towards voluntary precommitment schemes, working with the industry to do so. It is simply a waste of time and money for a federal government to be pushing these changes when they are already being looked at by the governments that are actually responsible for them, let alone to be attempting these changes with as little consultation with those state and territory governments as this government has had.

To implement these changes with any level of success, the state and territory governments have to be on board. Instead, the critical input of these governments, along with that of the hospitality sector and other stakeholders, has been sidelined in the determination to race this through the parliament. The legislation was first introduced on 1 November, and suddenly it has to be passed before the end of the sitting year.

Mr Lyons interjecting—

We'll see you at your club, mate! We'll see you at your club! If this government is really serious and determined to do something about gambling, why not work with the states? That is what the COAG process is there for. We all know that this is about political outcomes, not responsible ones.

Townsville has 45 venues with gaming machines. These are mostly clubs and small-business pubs. They have not seen any evidence that a precommitment system will reduce problem gambling. We are still waiting for the trial of mandatory precommitment, yet here we are pushing bills that come with great expense to local businesses and clubs in a knee-jerk reaction to a hung parliament.

The impact of this legislation will also be felt more by the smaller venues. The cost of compliance with every level of government is killing the will of businesspeople to get up every day. At the recent red-tape forum I held for the hospitality industry, I asked them if they were having any fun in their business at all. That is why you go into business. They all just sighed and said that the fun was being sucked out by all levels of government and by the cost of compliance and regulation. Now we are going to make it harder for them in an area in which we have no real jurisdiction—or is it just this government trying to muscle in on state government revenues? The legislation calls for levies and compliance costs. It calls for funding for new bodies that it must have to run this show. Is it just another tax grab by a cash-strapped government?

These businesses contribute to the community. They have real estate. They take on apprentices. They employ permanent and casual staff. And they are already paying a massive tax bill through the pokies that is redistributed to give grants to local organisations. We owe it to these businesses to take the time to get this right. In Townsville there are three main licensed clubs. They are the Townsville RSL, the mighty North Queensland Cowboys club and the Brothers Leagues Club. They have nearly 100,000 members, and I am proudly a member of each. The clubs and casino give back to the community over $3 million annually to projects which would never be funded otherwise. They take pride in their community because they are their community. They are my community.

I would like to share a story about the Townsville community transport, TOTTS. They had 39 volunteer drivers. The drivers are not required to have a first-aid certificate, but they wanted to make sure that all their drivers had a first-aid certificate. The cost was $120 each. I approached my licensed venues: the RSL, the Brothers Leagues Club and the Cowboys Leagues Club. To a person, they just said, 'We'll pay for it, and every time they get a new driver we'll put them through.' I said, 'Thank you very much for this.' They said: 'Don't thank me. This is what we're here for. This is what licensed clubs are for. This is the perfect example of why we have licensed clubs, of what we do in our community.' That cost is borne by those clubs because that is part of their community.

This is bad legislation. It will not help a single addicted gambler. It will not help licensed clubs provide for their members. I will not support this legislation, which specifically attacks major private sector employers and trainers in my electorate. Let me be as clear and unambiguous as I can. This legislation is not about problem gambling. This legislation is all about politics and staying in power.

See this speech in context