Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

A bit of fun with mates, fleeting enjoyment, inducements, 'free bets', hidden addiction, guilt and shame, financial distress, poor mental and physical health, drug and alcohol abuse, relationship breakdown, mortgage default, homelessness, childhood poverty, family violence, elder abuse, criminal activity, suicide: these are the products of the gambling industry.

This is what they are selling. And many Australians are buying.

The big sporting codes are complicit and dependant on the cut they get from every bet laid, their sponsorships from gambling companies and additional payments linked to the amounts gambled.

The broadcasting and advertising companies are bringing in the cash.

The government accepts political donations, as does the opposition.

And the regulation is patently inadequate to manage the risks.

It's been a year since, on 28 June 2023, the Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs handed down its You win some, you lose more report into online gambling and its impacts on those experiencing gambling harm.

The committee, chaired by the courageous MP the late Peta Murphy, recognised the harm being done by online gambling and gambling advertising to our children, to our young people and to those experiencing gambling addiction.

In that report, they said, 'Australians demand an end to saturation advertising of gambling products', and that is absolutely true.

The committee recommended the phasing out of gambling advertisement over three years with a comprehensive ban that 'leaves no room for circumvention' to halt what they call the 'inescapable torrent' of gambling advertising on all media.

I had hoped against hope for a strong and decisive government that would take this report and action the recommendations, so presumably did the seven in 10 Australians who want to see better regulation and support and a ban on gambling advertising. They are rightly concerned the industry is grooming children and young people through partnerships with sport, in particular.

But, in the intervening 12 months, there has been very little conversation and very, very little action.

Consulting the vested interests is like consulting the fox regarding its access to the henhouse.

And we cannot pretend they are at arm's length. Gambling companies have funnelled hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars in donations to the major parties at the federal level over the past decades or so of regulatory neglect.

The situation is only growing worse, and that is what deeply concerns me.

Roy Morgan research conducted in the 12 months to March this year, reported by the Alliance for Gambling Reform, shows the number of people betting on sports has more than doubled in the last five years.

Worryingly, almost a million Australians—to be accurate, 881,000—who sports bet are now considered 'problem' or moderate-risk gamblers, and that's according to the Problem Gambling Severity Index.

I do have a problem with the terms 'problem gamblers' and 'problem gambling'. The problem here is the harmful product, not the person, and this is a public health issue.

More than one-third of all spending on sports betting is coming from people experiencing gambling harm, even though so-called 'problem gamblers' represent only 10 per cent of the player base.

For some sports betting companies, people experiencing gambling harm make up almost 20 per cent of their entire customer base.

These companies are literally playing them to extinction.

This is why I am reintroducing my private members bill to ban all advertising of online gambling.

This has gone too far. The situation is dire. Regulations are lax, yet the government are doing very little to police this industry. The government have allowed, during their time in government, this industry to continue to flourish.

The minister's lack of action, I think, is embarrassing.

Work on BetStop commenced under the former government. The ban on the use of credit cards for online wagering was a proposal I first brought into this House as a private member's bill. And we have seen one insipid set of messaging replaced with another.

We are harming our young people by our lack of action in this place.

This is the tobacco advertising equivalent of our generation. Now, a previous generation of members of parliament had the courage and foresight to ban cigarette advertising, and we must and should do the same with gambling advertising. We just need a spine and we need to stand up to the big money.

The time for action on gambling advertising is now. It is today. And I urge members in this House to bring this to a debate. Let us take the moral high ground for once in this place.

See this speech in context