Gambling

In between promos for Revenge, My Kitchen Rules and Please Marry My Boy, tennis star Marcos Baghdatis had a wee meltdown at the Australian Open on Wednesday and smashed his way through four shiny blue tennis racquets.

Given he scored a pay cheque of $20,000 just for winning round one, the $770 fine meted out to Baghdatis must have made those poor racquets feel positively worthless.

I love the Aussie Open. Like interminable school holidays (“Muuum!” “Muuum!” “Muuum!”) it’s synonymous with summer. But if tempers can fray on the court, imagine how the rest of us feel at home.

Continue reading "The tennis is awesome but I don’t love all" »

Everyone’s talking about poker machines these days. Our politicians and our newspapers, our clubs and pubs; everyone has an opinion on what we should and shouldn’t do with regards to the pokies. But they’re talking about numbers and policies, votes and strategies and campaigns.

They’re not talking about the people who have been hurt, who are hurting still. People like me.

When I was 24 years old, I had the world on a string. Life was mine for the taking. I was engaged to be married and surrounded by fantastic friends; I had my university degree framed on the wall, a great job and excellent prospects. But by the time I turned 25, life as I knew it was over. I was addicted to poker machines.

Continue reading "I’d lie awake, pokie music running through my head" »

There are 20 minutes remaining. Score’s locked at 16-all. The young family is in the lounge room, a rare event in itself, nervously watching their Wests Tigers.

As a scrum is formed, Ray Warren proclaims with a hint of surprise the Tigers are $2.15 to win on TAB Sportsbet. Dad, slumped in his armchair, jolts, bolt upright. He commands his eight-year-old boy to bring him the phone. The little boy marvels as he watches Dad punch in the numbers with vigour.

Dad replaces his customary “hello” for a mysterious set of numbers, before announcing down the line - no, demanding - he will have a hundred dollars on the Wests Tigers, and doing it with a sense of pride. The conversation ends, the phone dispensed with.

Continue reading "Hey Xenophon, don’t shoot the gambling messengers" »

Father Chris Riley, founder of Youth Off The Streets, is under fire for attacking the proposed pokie reforms and siding with Clubs Australia; all while his charities pocket money from clubs. Here’s another perspective from a respected church leader.

In the race for headlines and hysteria, the poker machine reform debate has fallen through the cracks of serious social progress. In their eagerness to beat back the Government’s agenda on poker machines, pushing their polished and focus tested ‘license to punt’ line, Big Clubs have churned out an astounding $20 million hoping to hit the jackpot.

Through my work with disadvantaged and discriminated Australians, I saw the implementation of poker machine reform as an opportunity to discuss the facts and impacts of problem gambling in Australia. Disappointingly, the lobbyists and ad agencies have had their way once again, turning an issue that destroys lives and families into yet another expensive political sideshow.

Continue reading "Pokie reform will help people know when to fold ‘em" »

Tony Abbott described the events in Canberra yesterday surrounding the speakership of the Parliament as a bad day for democracy. Abbott was right, but for the wrong reasons.

The most undemocratic outcome of yesterday’s events could now be that a reform aimed at making life more bearable for problem gamblers, which is supported by a majority of Australians, will now be dumped because Labor has the numbers in the house to get away with pulling it, thus avoiding a fight to the death with powerful gambling interests.

Labor might have been cock-a-hoop at yesterday’s developments but the people who will be even happier are the cashed-up, morally ambivalent multi-millionaires in the gaming industry, who have been escalating their self-interested campaign to knock off suburban Labor MPs lest the Government support the proposed pokie reforms.

Continue reading "Hokey-pokie over speaker may shaft problem gamblers" »

It’s clear from his Punch article that Reverend Tim Costello hasn’t bothered to speak to manufacturers, the industry, or even read the Productivity Commission report before making his claims about mandatory pre-commitment.

In fact based on his claims, I doubt he’d be able to identify a pokie in a police line-up.

We get it Tim. You hate pokies. So much so that you rejected the $500,000 donation club members tried to give World Vision after the Boxing Day Tsunami. Fortunately CARE Australia and Father Chris Riley’s Youth off the Streets had no issue accepting the eventual $3 million.

Continue reading "Costello is a one armed bandit of misinformation" »

By now, you’re sick of the Cup, we’re sick of the Cup. But here’s a doozy of a dilemma regarding the luckiest and most ungrateful punter in Australia.

On Tuesday, a friend of The Punch’s went to the TAB to put on his bets. Before leaving, he asked his workmates if he could put any bets on for them.

One guy in his 60s gave our friend $6 for a “mystery box trifecta”. That’s when the TAB computer randomly selects three horses and if they run the placings any which way, the bet wins.

Continue reading "Friday Dilemma: How to reward a Melb Cup angel?" »

Now our Melbourne Cup flutters are out of the way it is worth investigating how it became valid political logic that the healthy fabric of Australian life would be shredded without big-scale gambling.

Not on horses, but gambling on pokies. Not by once-a-year punters or leviathan professionals, by low-income earners who can suddenly find their rent has disappeared down the maw of a gaming machine.

The glorified role of pokies is a political creation and it is total rubbish.

Continue reading "Pokie palaces are sucking the life out of communities" »

Tom Waterhouse has driven me to this.

The scion of the Waterhouse racing family appearing far too often on my television to declare that while he possessed no actual talent he would happily part me with my money was – as they say – the last straw.

Watching the Wallabies get smashed by the Kiwis in the World Cup was hard enough without watching Waterhouse continually pop up on my screen asking for cash like some transient beggar.

Continue reading "Why I’m boycotting the punting slaughterhouse" »

I don’t have any huge vested interest, but I do enjoy a $20 flutter with Mum every couple of months. So what is all this fuss about pokies reform?

Will punters like me be affected? Will proposed changes really help the nation’s 95,000 pokie-playing problem gamblers (and a million other Aussies affected by the ripple)? And will the deal struck between the Gillard Government and Independent Andrew Wilkie decimate our pubs and clubs – indeed our way of life?

Number 1: The changes will have ZERO impact on the average recreational player. Most of us (88 per cent) spend less than $1 per button push. The mandatory pre-commitment cards proposed as part of these new reforms relate only to “high-intensity” betting of more than $1 per spin.

Continue reading "My name is Lainie and I enjoy the pokies" »

Gambling is a serious social problem with horrendous consequences for the vulnerable. I grew up in suburban Brisbane and my most vivid childhood memory of my step father is when he violently ransacked my brother’s school bag for $1.50 and said, “F—k Dean, he can go without.”

He took the boy’s lunch money, slammed the door, and went down to the TAB to place a bet on another horse destined to lose. I’ve never looked at the man the same way since.

Such is the addictive power of gambling that a father would rather see his own son go hungry so he can satisfy his hunger to gamble. Gambling addiction is a disease. It consumes, controls, and destroys. It’s a monster. I know because I’ve seen it. In the long-running sitcom, The Simpsons, Homer Simpson even gave a name to the addictive power of gambling when Marge got hooked on the pokies at George Burns’ casino. He called it “Gamblor”.

Continue reading "The gambling beast is greedy and shows no mercy" »

As Australian Parliamentarians consider their voting positions on poker machine mandatory pre-commitment technologies, the impact on gambling on society, and a sensible and evidence based approach to fix the downsides to gambling, it’s important to consider what regulating this leisure activity will mean to inbound tourism over the next decade and beyond.

To maintain international competitiveness, many Australian casinos have been actively investing in new tourism infrastructure and upgrading existing properties. The total capital expenditure program across Australian casinos exceeds AU$4.4 billion with impressive upgrades to Crown Melbourne and Burswood in Perth, The Star in Sydney, and SKYCITY in Darwin amongst others.

Over the same time, there has been increasing competition from Asia, most notably in the emergence of ‘integrated resorts’ that offer unprecedented opportunities to grow international tourism.  Singapore has overseen the construction of two integrated casino resorts at a combined cost of around AU$12 billion. 

Continue reading "Kill the pokies and risk killing tourism too" »

Christmas is going to be awkward at the Swans’ this year.

And it won’t be an inappropriate gift causing the tension and a possible barney.

It’ll be Labor’s mandatory pre-commitment policy for poker machines.

Continue reading "Little brother’s Big Brother law dumps the local surf club" »

It is hard to believe the NRL, a code which galvanises communities in two of the largest states in Australia, could be staring at financial collapse because of the Gillard Government’s gambling reforms.

It is hard to believe that the AFL, the national game which enjoys the status of a religion in four states and one territory, is also facing ruin because of the mandatory pre-commitment proposal to make gamblers think about how much they are prepared to wager on poker machines before placing a bet.

It is hard to believe because it is simply unbelievable. It is hard to believe because it is rubbish.

Continue reading "The depressing truth about football’s gambling addiction" »

The Revesby Workers’ Club in Sydney’s far south-west used to do a lot for charities, pensioners and kids. It doesn’t anymore though, according to an article in the club’s latest quarterly magazine.

“The poker machine tax is crippling us”, the club’s secretary says in the article. “We can’t afford to help the community anymore. We’re a club and our first duty is to our members – we have to provide amenities for them. It’s a shame we can’t do both.”

Poker machine tax? Does that have anything to do with what NRL commentator Phil Gould was ranting about when the footy was on last Friday? Does it have something to do with that “footy tax” Eddie McGuire has been yapping about? Or whatever those WHO VOTED FOR A LICENCE TO PUNT? coasters at the club are all about? It sure sounds like it. But nope.

Continue reading "Pissing away the future with pokies, then and now" »

Nothing better symbolises the hypocrisy that surrounds sports betting in this country than this painting, which depicts the scenes in the Collingwood rooms after last year’s grand final.

You can’t see it at this resolution, but if you view the original painting up close, a betting slip is clearly visible in the hand of Tyson Goldsack, who is the bloke about fourth from the left standing against the wall with another player’s arm around his shoulder.

The slip contains the words “Mrs” and “80-1” and “first goal” – a reference to the successful bet Goldsack’s Mum placed on her son kicking the first goal. Nothing was untoward about that bet. But all the same, it’s a nice irony given the events of the past week.

Continue reading "It’s time to torpedo the punt" »

It’s not often a Government Minister admits to a fatal flaw in their policy, so I congratulate Jenny Macklin for her honesty.

On Tuesday, while attacking clubs and the NRL because they are standing up to Labor’s mandatory pre-commitment policy, a policy that could destroy them, Ms Macklin revealed exactly why it will fail.

She wrote: “…before you sit down at the machine you nominate how much you’re willing to lose, set a limit you can afford – and then stick to it”.

Continue reading "The real one-armed bandit is Andrew Wilkie" »

A mate of mine has a nephew at private school in Sydney. Apparently, many of the kids are betting on the dogs, with one boy losing $1200 in a single day.

Some might think the loss of $1200 is just deserts for a rich little twit with too much cash on his hands. I think it’s just one more sign that sports betting is out of control in Australia.

Here’s another one: an Adelaide businessman recently rang SA Senator Nick Xenophon’s office in a bid to warn others about online gambling during AFL matches. He’d lost $85,000 in three weeks after being enticed by one of those gambling ads that run relentlessly during televised games.

Continue reading "Sports betting: Gambling’s no game" »

Is match fixing and sports corruption a big enough problem to suggest that offenders should be thrown into jail for up to 10 years? You bet!

There have been one or two major betting-related incidents in Australian sport. Personally, I was closely involved when Shane Warne and Mark Waugh got themselves involved with the now notorious “John the bookie” back in 1998.

But for me, the issue actually goes back further to 1990 in my days at the National Basketball League, when I first started thinking about and studying the issue.

Continue reading "Corruption in sport: Send match fixers to the slammer" »

James Packer had better watch his back. He’s just hired the guy who helped knock off former NSW Premier Morris Iemma for Nathan Rees, then rolled Rees for Kristina Keneally, and played a key role in last year’s putsch which replaced Kevin Rudd with Julia Gillard.

On the basis of recent performance, the appointment of former national ALP secretary Karl Bitar as Crown Casino government relations lobbyist could mean that the gambling empire will soon be run by Kerry Stokes from the Seven Network.

If there is such a thing as purgatory it may well be Melbourne’s Crown Casino. There is a story that at the Casino’s gala opening in 1997, dozens of white doves were released into the night sky, and were promptly incinerated in the balls of flame that blast from the braziers on the Yarra’s banks. It might be an apocryphal tale but it’s a nice bit of imagery for a place which wrongly presents gambling as nothing other than innocent fun.

Continue reading "Packer’s patsy sells his soul, and our intellectual property" »

After more than a decade in politics, I have sadly grown used to watching the often bizarre stances taken by other pollies and wondering why they are doing what they are doing.

The response of some members of the Coalition to the poker machine issue is a case in point.

To truly understand the Coalition’s current position on pokies, you need to know it has nothing to do with pokies.

Continue reading "Coalition stance on pokies has nothing to do with pokies" »

It’s stating the obvious, but problem gamblers have a problem. They suffer from a horrible addiction – the same as alcoholics and druggies – that causes impulses they cannot resist and consequences that affect all those around them.

Like all addicts, problem gamblers go to extreme lengths to get their fix. For 60 per cent, that involves committing a crime to get the cash to feed their habit.

A report by private corruption investigation group Warfield & Associates found poker machines were the most common way to gamble stolen money. The study found between 2008-10 a whopping $13 million was stolen to play the pokies.

Continue reading "Labor’s pokies reforms are the biggest gamble of all" »

Yesterday in The Punch, David Penberthy ridiculed the gambling industry’s claims that pokie-reform was un-Australian. But the $20m campaign by Australian Hotels Association and Clubs Australia campaign about the so-called “licence to punt” is more than just shallow and bankrupt politicking – it’s plainly misleading.

There is NO proposal to have a licence to punt and those concerned about the damage poker machines do are not calling for a licence to punt.

The pre-commitment scheme currently under consideration applies only to poker machines (not punting more generally) and at its simplest is a basic consumer protection tool which will allow gamblers to pre-set a limit to how much they will spend.

Continue reading "Big Gaming is pushing all the wrong buttons" »

To borrow from their confected dinki-di lexicon, the Australian gaming industry must be officially up shit creek without a paddle if the best it can do is declare that a carefully-considered package of reforms aimed at helping problem gamblers is “un-Australian.”

If being Australian means turning your back on desperate addicts in the name of multi-billion-dollar profits, maybe we should consider moving overseas.

The good thing about moving overseas would be that we wouldn’t have to endure people rabbitting on about how un-Belgian, un-Mexican or un-Ugandan things had become. It’s a construction which seems peculiar to this country. It’s peculiar alright. We spend a lot of time in this country debating what it is that makes us Australian, yet it seems that the people who run the gambling industry have come up with their handy definition of what it is to be un-Australian.

Continue reading "I am, you are, we’re un-Australian" »

There is a punchy two-word response to claims from the sporting community about the multi-million dollar losses they will sustain if the Federal Government presses ahead with measures to tackle gambling addiction. Sucked in.

For sheer intellectual laziness and candid self-interest, documents don’t get much worse than the formal submission by the South Australian National Football League to the parliamentary inquiry on gaming reform.

Summarised, the SANFL argues that the measures to reduce problem gambling will cost the State’s football clubs $7 million a year. The document is framed around inertia in that it argues for the status quo, rejecting all measures such as compelling gamblers to register with clubs before they spend money on poker machines, and to specify how much money they want to spend if they choose to do so.

Continue reading "No pity for the poor pokie-addicted millionaires" »

It’s every punter’s dream - betting with money they don’t have. But don’t think this fantasy is limited to wealthy bankers, lawyers and high-profile footballers like Brendan Fevola.

If you have a job and a place of residence, then congratulations. You, too, can get instant credit with one of Australia’s 40 odd corporate bookies. It’s easier than getting a phone line or gas connected, and it’s nothing short of a national scandal.

There were two disturbing aspects to Sunday’s brilliant exposé by Phil Rothfield and Rebecca Wilson. The first is that we all have to feel sorry for Brendan Fevola now that he’s a “victim” of gambling addiction, rather than just a common and garden variety idiot. The second is that anyone could end up in Fev’s shoes.

Continue reading "Fevola not the only mug addicted to free bookie credit" »

From a look at the betting markets, punters seem to have lined up with pundits to call this week a nil-all draw.

While the campaign descended into a Fromelles-style bloodbath, the negativity of both sides also stagnated the head-to-head betting market and we’ll go to the polls with Labor paying $1.28 to win, and the Coalition pegged at $3.60.

You’ll remember that last week saw Julia Gillard’s campaign finally stem the haemorrhaging that saw her odds on next PM drift out to $1.62, which was as bad as they got under Rudd. Once Sportingbet took over $400,000 on Labor in a week including a bet of $200,000, they were always going to head into the election as favourites.

Continue reading "The punters: Labor to win, with a major loss of skin" »

There’s no doubt that last week was a long time in politics for the Labor camp.

A better-than-expected debate performance from Abbott last Sunday had punters swarming behind the Coalition when I wrote my previous column for The Punch on the Tuesday – although some of your comments questioned whether he’d really cause the government any trouble.

By Friday, 85 percent of the money we’d taken was for the Coalition, causing them to shorten up dramatically from $3.85 into $2.50. All the chatter from the talking heads declared Labor’s campaign dead, buried, cremated following a series of damaging Cabinet leaks and the Monday Newspoll had Abbott neck and neck with Gillard.

Continue reading "Follow the money: punting not as tight as the polling" »

Just when you thought that funnelling your hard earned cash into a soulless machine in the darkest reaches of a hotel couldn’t get anymore depressing, it turns out now your kids can watch.

Disturbingly, The Pink Hill Hotel in Beaconsfield has been given permission to build a children’s playroom enclosed with soundproof glass so that parents can keep an eye on their children from the gaming room.  Fabulous! 

Now the whole family can revel in the joys of daddy getting 3 pyramids in a row on the Queen of the Nile. 

Continue reading "Your local gaming room, now a handy creche" »

In the hours following Sunday night’s Leaders Debate, a strange thing happened: punters started backing Tony Abbott for the first time since the election was called last Saturday.

In doing so, they not only pre-empted yesterday’s Newspoll but confirmed most of the analysis about the Opposition leader’s performance in the papers: it could’ve been a lot worse.

As someone who has been taking bets on elections for years, it was a hard to imagine a bigger game changer in a betting market than when the ALP changed jockeys just weeks out from this election campaign.

Continue reading "Follow the money: punters finally getting on Abbott" »

The AFL, that over-officious sporting body which struts its self-importance like a hired goon from Underbelly, has gone completely power mad, imposing ruthless penalties on officials who placed some of the world’s smallest bets.

Get this. AFL Timekeeper Matthew Hollington has been stood down for five weeks for placing a $5 bet on an AFL game in 2009, when he was a trainee timekeeper.

AFL interchange steward John Wise has been booted out for the remainder of season 2010 for placing $9 worth of bets in the 2009 season, all in $1 and $2 denominations.

Continue reading "Heavy-handed AFL loses the plot over betting officials" »

The Ruddster had a win - and he’s going off. Watch it here.

Now that the Cup’s behind us and Shocking has won it, let’s get serious about addressing the massive gap in our national dialogue on gambling. It’s that gap that’s referred to in the title of this piece.

Punch deputy editor Tory Maguire wrote a great piece recently on the scourge of the pokies. In it, she summarised some of the measures proposed to combat that electronic plague. But where is the same debate about racing?

The Melbourne Cup is a great national event. I’ve written about it in glowing, enthusiastic terms twice on this website this week, and countless times elsewhere. I once even argued that Cup Day should be our National Day. Everybody, sing with me: Horse Trainers all let us rejoice…

Continue reading "Shocking result but gambling is the real winner" »

At the risk of being kicked out of the country I am going to ask whose kids had a little flutter on the Melbourne Cup today?

I heard a radio announcer talking about her spend for the day - which was just fine - until she tacked on at the end, “and the kids have a little $10 bet each.”

Okay – let’s forget for a minute that it is illegal for persons under 18 to gamble and think just a bit about the oft documented impact of problem gambling on Australian society. $18 billion a year in losses and seven people affected by each person with a gambling problem.

Continue reading "Should kids bet on the Cup?" »

1. VIEWED
Barrier: 9. Jockey: Brad Rawiller. Trainer: Bart Cummings. Odds: $5
Last year, he was an anonymous 40-1 shot. This year, the ’08 winner is a raging hot favourite who’s added the ’09 Caulfield Cup to his rapidly bulging CV. If he wins, Bart Cummings will be made president of the new Australian republic, alive or dead.

2. C’EST LA GUERRE
Barrier: 7. Jockey: Nicholas Hall. Trainer: John Sadler. Odds: $25
His name means “it’s war”, but last year’s third placegetter won’t fire a shot this year. The jockey’s Dad, Greg Hall, famously waved his whip in triumph in ’97, only to lose in a photo. Young Nick won’t get the chance to make the same mistake this year.

Continue reading "The almost official Punch Melbourne Cup form guide" »

My first reaction to James Packer’s claims that casinos contribute positively to the community was, ‘Spoken like a true billionaire’.

The comments seemed as removed from reality as James’ fortune allows him to be.

Specifically James told the Crown AGM:” Next time you read an unbalanced story about…casinos and their impact on the community, stop and think about the other side of the story.” And that story as James tells it seems to be a work of fiction.

Continue reading "James you should get your head out of your pokies" »

James Packer has clearly decided that attack is the best form of defence in aiming a strident up-yours at critics of casinos - which he of the diminishing billions billed today as the unsung heroes of job creation, urban renewal, skills training and government assistance.

“Next time you read an unbalanced story about your casinos and their impact on the community, stop and think about the other side of the story,’’ the Crown chairman said at today’s AGM in Melbourne.

“The one that rarely gets reported. That is, of the contribution Crown makes to tourism, to employment, to training, to urban development, to community partnerships and to government revenues. Contributions that make us fundamentally different to many pubs and clubs.”

Continue reading "Please - lay off casinos and be kinder to James Packer" »

Towards the end of the recent 4Corners report on James Packer’s gambling fortunes former PBL director Geoff Cousins gave his assessment of the casino game.

“They’re frankly just a horrible business,” Cousins said. “They live off the misfortunes of others and they are a completely non productive business. They don’t create anything, they just take people’s money and shove it down a hole and now and again if they’re forced to, they give a tiny bit of it back.”

It was an excellent summation that could equally be applied to the casino’s little brother: poker machines.

Continue reading "‘Managed liberalisation’ a soft touch on pokie scourge" »

The arrogance, the sheer bloody arrogance and pig-headedness of Australian Racing Board chief Andrew Harding and his cronies.

Harding turfed the concerns of jockeys out the window yesterday after they formally approached the board seeking minor amendments to new whipping rules.
Under the new laws which were brought in on August 1, jockeys have numerous restrictions on the number of times they can “whip” their mounts with the soft, padded whips in mandatory use nowadays.

Continue reading "If anyone needs a whipping it’s racing administrators" »

It seems that our obsession with having a bet has even reached the rat community.  If, however, rats can have a punt while considering the odds and make a decision based on reason, as the article suggests, it probably puts them a step ahead of most of us.  As Kent Brockman may have said in response to this: “I, for one, welcome our new Rat Overlords.”

This news of course comes at a time when the ongoing practice of everyone’s favourite network, Channel 9, of giving live betting updates during sporting events, continues apace.  During the summer it was Betfair odds during the cricket and now it’s TAB Sportbet during the rugby league season.  Many people, including me, find the practice appalling, but Nine have never really been known for giving two hoots about what the ethical among us think, as long as there’s a dollar in it for them.

The League calls feature renowned punters Ray “Rabbits” Warren and Peter “Sterlo” Sterling giving live updates on the current Sportbet odds as the match they commentate on progresses, accompanied by a rather feeble-sounding closing rider about betting responsibly.  Older readers in non-NRL states probably know Rabbits, aka Rabs, from his previous life as a horse racing caller.  Younger ones may know him from his swimming commentary, which sounds much like his horse racing commentary.

Continue reading "Forget footy - give us odds on being sent to the doghouse" »