Roche Denise: Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2) — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeRoche Denise: Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2) — In Committee[Sitting date: 11 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1510. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DENISE ROCHE (Green):I rise to take a call on Part 2 and possibly Part 3 of this bill in the Committee of the whole House. I think I would like to comment on some of the issues that have already been raised. I am particularly concerned about the tenor of some of the comments from the New Zealand First speaker Clayton Mitchell and also from the speaker who has just resumed her seat Sarah Dowie. These were about the issue of problem gambling and problem gamblers. I do seriously believe that we need to move away from pathologising the person who is gambling and direct our attention to what is essentially a dangerous product.This bill does talk about minimising gambling harm and therefore it recognises that gambling machines particularly in class 4 venues are dangerous. They are a dangerous product. So when you blame the person who is using the product you are actually letting the people who reap the benefits of the machine off the hook. I think we need to accept that there are mechanisms that we can put in place and that we should be putting in place that can make gambling on pokie machines or electronic gaming machines much safer.This brings me to Supplementary Order Paper 84 which we are putting forward in the name of Kevin Hague which talks about introducing real-time player tracking and pre-commit cards to all gamblers. What this would do is give an absolute assurance that anybody who is even starting to display behaviour that looks like it may be getting out of control can be taken aside straight away which can absolutely minimise the harm that could happen from gambling. It is like having seatbelts and an airbag in a car. It would make the product safe.However we need to recognise that this is an industry that is washing in money. There was $2.09 billion lost in gambling in the 2013-14 financial year. The Department of Internal Affairs suggests that around 40 percent of that came from class 4 gambling which is the gambling and pokies in clubs and pubs. As one of my colleagues in the House who has spoken previously said that money from class 4 gambling is specifically for community purposes. That is the only reason we can have clubs and pubs with pokie machines in them. That money does have to be distributed in the community which is one of the issues that I think has been quite problematic since the time that this bill was introduced and one of the underlying reasons the Act was introduced in the first place.The distribution of those funds is constantly subject to rorts and disgraceful conduct. We saw quite recently a multidisciplinary investigation involving the Serious Fraud Office the Department of Internal Affairs and the police. That resulted in the arrest of four people who were associated with the racing industry over what could probably be considered a “money-go-round” in terms of the grants that come from class 4 gambling. I recognise that the bill does talk about racing being a community purpose where money from class 4 gambling can go. However I think we should recognise that if we allow that to continue—and we have a Supplementary Order Paper that puts a cap on the amount of money that could go to racing purposes—we are essentially allowing one form of gambling to subsidise another form of gambling. I do not recall racing or racehorse owners ever being a registered charity which is where this money is supposed to go. So we support strengthening transparency around the distribution of funds.I also just want to touch on the fact that we do need to strengthen our problem-gambling and host responsibility reform in this country. We have still got this situation where even though there are requirements under the Act—and strengthened presumably in this bill—for host responsibility programmes to be in place and notices to be put up in venues where pokie machines are being played frequently the host responsibility is not being monitored or even adhered to at all.We can see the evidence of that in the sting that the Department of Internal Affairs operated at the end of last year. Essentially it set up a mystery shopper type of scenario where mystery shoppers went into class 4 gambling venues and sat at pokie machines. They sat there for considerable time and said things like “I am meant to go home to the kids but another few minutes won’t hurt.” or “I can’t really afford it but I think I’m getting close to a win.” or “I need to go but I need to win some money back.” They displayed distress while they were sitting there and they did this in front of the staff. The department checked and did this in 102 different venues. And do you know what? One hundred and one of them ignored those problem-gambling displays. I think we can say that the industry is not complying voluntarily with problem-gambling harm minimisation. That is why we need regulation and that is why we should actually ask the Minister of Internal Affairs to accept the Supplementary Order Paper that Kevin Hague is putting forward. That would make the machines safe and would eradicate completely the issue of problem gambling because the seatbelts and the air bags would work.I also want to touch on the issue of problem gambling in casinos and at pokie machines there. In the beginning of the year last year in 2014 Television One showed an article where it had sent a pensioner into the casino at Skycity in Auckland and said to that person to just stay there and gamble for as long as it takes before someone comes and intervenes and notices that they had been sitting there. That pensioner stayed in front of that pokie machine for 14 hours before they left. There was no intervention whatsoever from any Skycity staff. As a result of that I wrote to the Department of Internal Affairs’ gambling compliance unit and asked that it investigate. I made an official complaint. In July 6 months after the original incident I received a notice from the Department of Internal Affairs—a response saying that basically it was working with Skycity to improve its host responsibility practice. If this is the type of censure a venue is going to get for flouting the law then we are seriously seriously irresponsible in the way we are making our laws because we need to have regulation that brings these organisations these companies and these trusts into line.International evidence suggests that 40 percent of all the money that is lost on pokie machines—so that is 40 percent of the 40 percent of the $2.09 billion that was lost in gambling last year; 40 percent of 40 percent of that—basically comes from people with limited control over their gambling behaviour.Clayton Mitchell: That’s not class 4 gambling though.DENISE ROCHE: No that is actually—Clayton Mitchell: All gambling.DENISE ROCHE: Yes—no that is from pokie gaming.Clayton Mitchell: Includes Lotto—that includes everything.DENISE ROCHE: Yes that is what I said—40 percent of the $2.09 billion that was lost. According to the Department of Internal Affairs today that is what was lost at class 4 gaming venues. So 40 percent of that Mr Mitchell is what came from problem gambling and problem gamblers. So if we consider that that is an awful lot of money going into the coffers of both the trusts and the venues—and in the case—