Sharples Pita: Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2) — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSharples Pita: Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2) — First Reading[Sitting date: 22 August 2007. Volume:641;Page:11412. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr PITA SHARPLES (Co-Leader—Māori Party): Tenā koe Mr Speaker. I would like to take a call on this bill as one who enjoys a game of blackjack and pontoon and craps and one or two others. However I do want to highlight the danger of problem gaming. The biggest-ever sales promotion leading up to Lotto’s 20th birthday this Saturday 25 August is full of expressions of joy. We are told that: “Since Lotto was launched in 1987 New Zealanders have won over $3.6 billion in prizes there have been thousands of happy winners and thousands of happy stories of positive changes in people’s lives.” Well I hate to be a killjoy but the story of gambling in Aotearoa is not exactly happy happy happy joy joy joy. Sure there have been changes in people’s lives—massive changes. Some researchers estimate that between 1 and 3 percent of New Zealand adults have experienced problems with gambling at some stage in their lives.Of course it is not just an individual problem. On average 10 to 17 people are affected by the problem gaming of one person. It is also estimated that only 15 percent of those with problems associated with gambling seek help. There will be many more affected people who are not receiving assistance. Gambling affects families and communities to tragic ends. In monetary terms $35 million is gambled every day here in Aotearoa—$35 million—and $5.5 million is lost every day. It is money lost by people many of whom can least afford to lose it.It is not just about some harmless fun with an armless bandit a shuffle of cards and a roll of the dice to see whether Lady Luck will strike. Gambling creates enormous harm especially in communities identified as high-deprivation or low-income. Dr Lorna Dyall describes this as an environmental hazard due to the placement of gaming machines in areas that are predominantly decile 1 on the deprivation scale. Consequently the Māori Party has always said that we should manage gambling as a social hazard rather than as a harmless leisure pursuit. Just as people in communities are protected through management of chemical and biological hazards so too should there be protections in place to safeguard our well-being from gambling which we know is hazardous to health.In this context obviously the fact that the Gambling Act 2003 has not been all plain sailing concerns us. The Act is a large complex and very prescriptive piece of legislation so it is not surprising that there have been difficulties with its implementation. The purpose of that legislation includes both controlling the growth of gambling and minimising the harm caused by problem gaming. Those are worthwhile goals—goals that we will support.I turn to controlling the growth of gambling. As the first aim is to reduce the activity of gambling it is a major problem that so little progress has been achieved since the Act was introduced in 2003. The Department of Internal Affairs released figures on 1 August showing that the spending on pokies in bars and clubs has increased by just under 5 percent in the last year. The department installed an electronic monitoring system in April so we are able to produce accurate figures on pokie expenditure for the first time. We have to wonder what is going on when despite the legislation and despite the regulations the spending has still shot up by 5 percent. It is disappointing but obviously necessary that 4 years later we have to revisit some technical amendments to clarify the definitions sections and the various provisions relating to gambling venues and their enforcement.We heed the advice of the Problem Gaming Foundation that this review provides us with a great opportunity for all parties to get in behind substantial reform of the gambling industry. We in the Māori Party have been calling for investigations into loansharking and money-laundering at casinos and we have been consistently advocating for Māori to have a clear role in deciding the place of gambling in Aotearoa. This bill may provide us with the opportunity to do that. But we are pleased that the bill introduces some new provisions to identify and assist problem gamblers which we absolutely support. Gambling is a huge problem for Māori. Ethnicity and in particular identifying as Māori is now described as a key indicator of the likely risk of problem or pathological gambling.Dr Wīremu Manaia of the Problem Gambling Research Initiative has reported that for many Māori people their low socio-economic status makes them particularly vulnerable to gambling problems. What concerns us is that although one in three people who are utilising gambling treatment services identify as Māori reports indicate that Māori underuse the gambling treatment services in relation to need. There are a lot more Māori out there who are experiencing gambling-related harm than perhaps the figures tell us.So what does this mean in real terms? Well in 2003 the Salvation Army surveyed people accessing food banks in South Auckland. Over one-third of the people applying for food parcels had a problem gambler in their household and of that third 80 percent had two or more children. The legislation now requires venue managers and licence holders to take all reasonable steps to assist a person identified as a problem gambler. It includes prescribing the content and training standards for problem-gaming awareness training. The legislation also introduces statutory requirements for casinos class 4 operators to record problem-gambler exclusions and provides relevant information on request. Those are positive interventions which we are pleased to support. They demand greater attention to detail and care to identify and record individuals at risk and all of that has to add to greater awareness and a commitment to change.I want to draw the attention of the House to the courage and commitment of communities in fighting the hazards of gambling. Last week I heard some great news coming out of my electorate in Tamaki Makaurau. South Auckland is heavily targeted by the pokie trusts because they know that low-income people are more likely to develop problem-gaming behaviour than other sections of the population. Gaming machines are in fact five times more likely to be concentrated in the two most deprived deciles along with 50 percent of the TAB outlets. So it is hardly surprising that Māori and Pasifika peoples in South Auckland are over-represented in the statistics of people affected by problem gaming.Even worse there is a false illusion painted that gambling returns funds to the local community. The legislation requires that a minimum of 30 percent of gambling profits must benefit the local community but that is the community at large not necessarily the local community from where the money was gained. The Problem Gambling Foundation estimates that the local economy is losing 17 times more money than what the community groups are receiving back. Against that context it was really wonderful to hear last week that nearly 7500 submission have been received urging tighter restrictions on the number of pokie machines in Manukau. These 7500 submissions were from people standing up to take control of their community challenging the armless bandits to release their grip on the people of South Auckland. There are also many strong advocates such as Dr Lorna Dyall who have been calling for changes to the Gambling Act to empower communities to have the authority to remove gambling venues and pokie machines from outside of their area.We should expect there to be more cultural content in the existing services and that there should be increased cultural competence on the part of clinicians. We should expect a role in developing policy and legislation to deal with the problems alongside the Crown. That would involve tangata whenua membership as of right on the bodiesthat regulate gambling. The elimination of gambling harm must be an outright priority for this Parliament.The Māori Party members will support this bill. We look forward to hearing in the select committee process the ideas and advice about how best to facilitate community involvement in decisions about the provision of responsible gambling activities and which sections of our communities benefit from those activities. We support the first reading of this bill.