Collins Judith: Gambling Bill — Third Reading 
Collins Judith: Gambling Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:611;Page:8636] 
JUDITH COLLINS (NZ National—Clevedon) 
: 
 Today is a sad day. It is a sad day for the families of New Zealand. I note that United Future members are here laughing smiling and thinking that it is all just too funny. It is not funny. This bill has some very good provisions. I would like to record that I have given the Minister some credit for them and I am sure he is aware of that. There are some good provisions but there are also some shocking provisions and the allowing by the Lotteries Commission of Internet gambling has to be the worst anti-family provision. It is on a par with the “lesbian father” type of provision that this Government has brought in. 
The United Future member might like to roll his eyeballs and smile and smirk. However on the one hand he said: “It wasn’t us. The Government did it. Labour forced us into it.” but on the other hand he has also been quoted as saying: “We’re particularly pleased with the changes allowing the Lotteries Commission to move into Internet-based gaming.” He also said: “It was brought in by the Government at the request of the Lotteries Commission.” So it is all its fault! That was confirmed in Parliament this afternoon by the Minister of Internal Affairs George Hawkins—so it is all his fault! United Future members cannot make a decision in favour of it—but they really did. That is quite clear. They knew this provision was coming but they did not alert the public or the people who voted for them. They kept quiet and let this happen. 
That is so sad. It is so sad because not only is this opening up the gates to Internet gambling but also it is opening the gates to Internet gambling by a State-run agency—that is the Lotteries Commission. That is so bad. It is as bad as if they said: “Let’s just let the Lotteries Commission now sell and promote cigarettes and alcohol—and worse than that we will make it a monopoly situation. In New Zealand only they will be able to do it.” That is exactly what we are doing here. 
Plenty of people have said that they would have been quite happy to look at—and certainly I would have been happy to look at—Internet gambling on the basis of a Lotto-type thing so that every Saturday people could go on the Internet rather than have to go down to the shop. A lot of people would have said that that was fair enough. But that is not what we are talking about here. When we had a proper look at this Supplementary Order Paper we realised that it was not that at all and that it was all about allowing online casinos. Any sort of online gaming will be ripe for the Lotteries Commission. 
When members of the Lotteries Commission last came in front of the Government Administration Committee I asked them what they had in place to deal with problem gambling and what they knew about problem gambling. I am very passionately concerned about problem gambling. I have seen what it has done to so many New Zealanders and in particular those in south Auckland where I live and which I represent. It means that so much more money will now come out of local businesses. 
If we go to the Minister’s electorate of Manurewa for instance we see pokie machine after pokie machine. At least the people who play on those machines have to get out of their beds take themselves out of the door trot down the road in a form of dress and play their game and then presumably run out of money. But in this case they will be able to go online with credit cards and they will not even have to get out of bed to gamble. It is a 24-hour activity and it will take money out of the communities that can least afford to lose it. That is the sad thing. We are not a party that says that people should not be able to go to a casino or play pokie machines but we do say that we have to have a safety net there for people who are unable to stop themselves when they should stop. 
I heard a member of United Future say the other day that 1 to 3 percent of people in New Zealand have a gambling problem. I am sure that that is exactly what he said. When I was chairperson of the Casino Control Authority we were told by all of the experts that anything from 3 to 6 percent of people had a gambling problem. The figures are now coming out that in the Manukau City area it is more like 9 percent. That is a big percentage. If we take generally two or more adults in a house we are talking about quite a large number of households affected very very badly by problem gambling. 
In problem gambling it does not matter how many ambulances are put at the bottom of the cliff. Would it not be a lot better to stop people actually falling over in the first place? This bill will not help that. It will very much hurt the very people whom we in Parliament should be doing our very utmost to protect. I note that the member for the Progressive Coalition is here and he is always going on about problem gambling. As I understand it he will support this bill. 
Hon Member 
: He’s not. 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: I think he will vote for it. 
Heather Roy 
: He’s disappointed. 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: He is disappointed but he will vote for it. What is the point of that? I am sure all the 10000 or so people who voted for him will be disappointed; they will want their money back. 
These people are saying that some of the things are so good that they just have to go along with it but sometimes we have to say that some of the provisions are so bad that we have to say: “No we’re not going to do a deal.” That is what United Future could do. The Government could not go in with the Greens. Green members have made their position absolutely clear. They have let the people of New Zealand know and they got very excited over that particularly all the people in the pub charities industry. They all knew about it and they would not have a bar of it. The Government had nowhere to go and United Future was in a position where it could have forced this change but it did not and that is a tragedy. 
Can we just move briefly to the pokie machines outside of casinos. These people have really got their act together. In particular I would like to say that the Charitable Gaming Association has been very good with putting in place codes of practice and best practices. These people after a lot of criticism including I have to say from myself before I came into Parliament have moved themselves to a position where they can be very proud of the work they have done. I am sure they will continue to go on to do even better work—because they are the people who actually get the money back out into the communities into the sports clubs and into arts groups out there letting the little people get some of it back and good on them for doing so because someone has to do it. 
So in essence this bill is a disappointment in a major way. Internet gaming is a bad bad move but there are other provisions that we are happy to support and the Minister is aware of that.