Mitchell Mark: Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2) — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMitchell Mark: Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2) — Third Reading[Sitting date: 24 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1855. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): It is my pleasure to take a call on the Gambling Amendment Bill (No 2). The Gambling Act 2003 took effect on 1 July 2004. The Act brought major reforms to the gambling sector and a significant shift in focus towards the minimisation of harm associated with gambling. After the Act came into effect it emerged that an amendment bill was needed to tidy up the errors and clarify provisions to ensure that they operated as originally intended. I actually sat on the Government Administration Committee which heard the original submissions last term. I think we were all motivated—everyone in this House and especially this National Government—in terms of making sure that we got a firm focus on harm minimisation.However the pokies are actually quite important. The revenue that is generated each year that goes back into our sports clubs and our community groups is significant: $637 million. I know that as someone who is actively involved in the Ōrewa Surf Lifesaving Club back in my own electorate. Some of the money that is generated through pokie gambling has been used to buy equipment like defibrillators and equipment that relates directly to surf lifesaving and what is required and needed by the patrols on the beach each summer. We are supporting Supplementary Order Paper 454 in the name of the Hon Peter Dunne. What this Supplementary Order Paper does is it clarifies the Secretary for Internal Affairs’ suspension and cancellation powers for licences and class 3 and class 4 operators and venues so it is clear that the power is available for past one-off breaches.I think this is really important and a couple of the other points also relate to this. It is important that the Department of Internal Affairs has got the power to go in there and sanction and act against operators that are in breach and it has to be able to do that retrospectively as well. It clarifies the Gambling Commission’s power to suspend or cancel a casino licence. To make it clear it is also available for past breaches—very similar in vein to the first point.The Supplementary Order Paper specifies ongoing obligations and duties on societies after licensing—for example to minimise costs maximise returns and minimise risks of problem gambling. Minimising costs is critically important because the first thing that struck me with an organisation that is responsible for the distribution of funds that are coming from pokies and class 4 gambling is the fact that if you look around the world—and I am not going to single anyone out in particular; I would not do that—there are organisations NGOs that are designed and developed to deliver aid into areas like say Africa. But when you actually have a look and you actually break down or if you were to audit where the money is going many of them are often running at 70 or 80 percent of the money raised—being used on admin. I do not think that the people making donations or the people supporting those types of organisations are doing that in anticipation that the 70 or 80 percent of the funds is going to administration. Of course the same situation could very quickly arise here if there were not very strict rules and regulations in place to prevent that from happening and there are.The Supplementary Order Paper specifies that societies must incur only actual reasonable and necessary costs which is a big part of what I have just been talking about and obviously is a big part of the Department of Internal Affairs’ responsibility in terms of auditing. There is also a part there—I am just struggling to see it at the moment—that relates to the treatment of depreciation. I see that the Hon Michael Woodhouse is in the House tonight and I am sure that he could relate to and understand having run a fairly big organisation himself the importance of being able to get depreciation right. It may sound easy; it is not actually that easy. There are always gaps that are wide open in terms of abuse around the way you handle and deal with depreciation so it is very important that this bill clearly spells out exactly how depreciation is going to be handled.In terms of harm minimisation we actually heard a submission the other day on the committee that I found fascinating and certainly the committee is looking into it more and seeing how viable the option is. It is facial recognition. The group that made the submission had just gone through a trial where it had used facial recognition as a way of monitoring and managing problem gamblers. The trial had been very successful and to me it seems like a pretty good solution actually.Brett Hudson: Sensible—very sensible.MARK MITCHELL: A sensible solution exactly. But of course there is a whole lot of work now to be done in terms of what the practicalities are in terms of actually being able to roll this out. I know one of the issues that was raised is that there are costs associated with it—I think anything up to about $30000 for a unit to actually attach to one of the gambling machines. Then of course there are the issues around having to make modifications to a gambling machine and how you do that whilst still remaining compliant. So those issues are going to have to be worked out and ironed out but they do not seem insurmountable to me. The facial recognition system seems like a very good system that will actually remove a lot of the stress that probably employees who are working in licensed premises where there are pokies have to deal with now in terms of trying to identify someone who is a problem gambler or who may be starting to develop a problem-gambling habit. They have to use an intervention to try to work out how to manage that. It would actually remove a lot of that—Brett Hudson: Much easier on the staff.MARK MITCHELL: Yes it would make the whole environment for the staff in terms of management much more effective and much easier for them. So I think that that is something that is going to be interesting and we will definitely keep a close look in terms of how that develops and where it goes.The behaviour of some class 4 gaming societies has been disappointing. There is no doubt about that. The audit that the Department of Internal Affairs carried out recently showed that there are definitely some areas that need to be focused on. But the positive thing about that is that we have got the audits happening and they are identifying the problems which means that remedial action can be taken to fix them. It also sends a very clear message to the sector that it is being watched it will be audited and the Department of Internal Affairs is across the issue. So to me that was a very positive thing—not positive in terms of that it could have been a far better result but positive in terms of that the sector is on notice and that with an ongoing audit programme we will definitely see an improvement in behaviour.Brett Hudson: That’s right—you’ve got to measure it to manage it Mr Mitchell.MARK MITCHELL: That is dead right—absolutely.So finally I would just like to say that the bill is very important. It does take positive steps in terms of tightening up the loopholes that were there and making it far clearer in terms of what can be done. I recommend this bill to the House. Thank you.