Simon Kennedy (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) | Hansard source

Do you think we should have taken it and left that debate? That is indefensible. The scale of this problem should shock every member of the House. It's $100 million a day that is lost—not gambled, lost. It's $100 million today and $100 million tomorrow. They are the highest losses on planet Earth.

ACMA—the only thing we're talking about is the ads—found that there were one million gambling advertisements aired across free-to-air television and metropolitan radio in a year, as well as more than half a million online. This advertising doesn't just tell people that gambling exists; it normalises it. It turns odds into part of the conversation with young kids at primary schools watching Australia versus Paraguay. For gambling addicts, it can provide a trigger at precisely the wrong moment to put them back into the tailspin. The first loophole they left was unlimited gambling advertising. This legislation allows it during sporting events' scheduled and unscheduled breaks. It's unlimited, all day, every day. Who drafted this? The Prime Minister needs to front up and ask those questions. Who drafted that?

Secondly, it completely ignored inducements. The late Peta Murphy was clear on this. This is the temerity of this man, to try and lecture me and bully this parliament to ignore that, telling us, 'Take it or leave it,' after he left that out. Thirdly, it ignores social media that uses personalised data to repeatedly target people. It happens when no-one else is watching. It happens when you're alone with your phone. All through my electorate, I see kids on their phones. The social media ban hasn't worked, and they can be targeted personally and repeatedly when no-one is watching.

The last thing I would say is that I commend the Labor members who stood up here today and spoke on this bill. I commend you for having the courage to do what not many do, which is talk about the need to go further, in spite of this prime minister, who tried to silence his backbench and silence his own party. I commend those Labor Party members because this is what this prime minister thinks democracy looks like: silencing his own party, trying to threaten the parliament—'Take it or leave it'—but he's been pushed into a humiliating backdown, a capitulation, because we're standing up for average Australians, and I commend those Labor Party members who are as well. That is what the Prime Minister thinks of this democracy, and that's what he thinks of your role as a backbencher. He wants to shut you up, get you into line and not have you speak out—'Take it or leave it.'

I welcome some things in this bill—to get gambling advertising off sporting uniforms and out of venues, restrictions on celebrities, stronger action on illegal offshore operators. Those are genuinely good stuff that will address harm. But good measures in a bill that allows those loopholes don't work. I want to be clear. We need a healthy, free-to-air television and journal television sector, a free press and a healthy free press. Because of that, I think we should look at removing what is a digital ID. They want to digitally ID every single person who logs into every single website—Facebook, Instagram, Claude, ChatGPT, Spotify, Kayo, Foxtel, Go, the Guardian, The Australian, the Daily Telegraph, you name it! You're going to have to digitally ID yourself. It's a digital ID by stealth. Remove that. There are 20 million customers who've got 7plus and 9now apps.

Secondly, we need to prevent digital leakage. We can't have this leak away from Australian free-to-air providers to these tech social media giants. We need to shut that down. If that means looking at an opt-in on the social media giant, so be it. Social media needs tighter advertising. Thirdly, we need to pass a fair news media bargaining incentive to support the free press and support free TV. We should be looking at protection with AI companies for the copyright for journalists and free-to-air networks. We should look at the anticompetitive behaviours by Google on their adware and advertising platforms. We need a healthy, free-to-air sector and free journalists and press sector.

This should not, ultimately, be an argument between Left and Right. It shouldn't be an argument between people who gamble and those who do not. It shouldn't be a contest to see which industry lobby can get the most meetings in Parliament House. This is about whether we are prepared to acknowledge the enormous harm that gambling advertising—just the advertising—can cause and if we can design laws that genuinely reduce the harm.

We want the next generation to grow up loving sport without being taught to gamble on it. We may not be able to undo the damage that gambling has already done to families in Australia, but I don't want the kids, those 10-year-olds at my local primary school, who were watching to see a Sportsbet ad and be walked through the odds before they're about to do it. Those 10-year-olds want to watch the Socceroos. They want to think about the players and have pride in this country, the green and gold. They want to think about the score and the excitement of representing Australia, about how they might take that back to the football pitches in their local area or to their local teams. I don't want the first lesson, just before the game begins, to be about the odds on the game or on the first goalscorer or what you can do with a multi, and neither does the rest of Australia. So, Prime Minister, stand up, grow a backbone and listen to Australia.

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