Welcome to Gambling Watch Global Community Blog,
a source for latest news, developments and reputable documentation and research on gambling. You'll find many helpful resources and links for anti-gambling advocates.
6/16/2008: Australians March against pokies
This Silent Scream March in Australia is being held to protest VLT’s and the lack of resources for problem gamblers.
Problem gamblers, counsellors, clinicians, researchers, activists and members of the public, your anonymity is assured!
No Pokies Senator Nick Xenophon, and Fairfield City Councillor Thang Ngo will be joining us on the day.
Come and meet them.World Vision CEO Tim Costello, NSW Greens MLC Lee Rhiannon and Family First
Senator Steve Fielding have been invited and (schedules permitting) will join us on the day and speak with the marchers.Thank you for helping make this day, one the government will be unable to ignore!
When: Sunday August 24th, 2008
Where: Tumbalong Park, Darling Harbour, Sydney
Gather: 10:30 am
March begins at 11:30
Contact: nellgwyn55 (at) bigpond (dot) com
4/21/2008: Tasmania Gambling study will be peer reviewed
The Tamania government study on gambling will be going through an independent peer review before being released. The study is being done for South Australian Centre for Economic Studies.
Australian Broadcasting Corportation
New crisis centre helps gambling addicts
Victorians pushed to the edge of suicide by poker machine debts are being treated at Australia’s first crisis service for depressed gambling addicts.
The pioneering program at Melbourne’s The Alfred hospital diverts suicidal gamblers from a hospital emergency department into specialised treatment, The Age reported on Saturday.
Most did not have mental health problems until they started playing the pokies. But some were using the machines to “zone out” and relieve symptoms of depression and anxiety.
The crisis service was set up after research found 71 suicidal people visiting The Alfred’s emergency department over six months were problem gamblers.
8/9/2007: Pokies and theft go hand in hand
THE use of poker machines has for the first time been linked to increases in crimes such as robbery, theft, fraud and forgery in Australia.
The results of a study by South Australian researchers published in the latest international Journal of Gambling Studies show the rate of “income-generating” crime was higher in areas of heavy expenditure on gaming machines.
The levels of “non-income-generating” crimes, such as assaults, public disorder and vandalism, did not show an increase.
The researchers from the University of Adelaide and the University of South Australia said their findings “provide some cause for concern” about the numbers of locations of gaming machines.
“In this study, gaming machine expenditure was found to influence positively and significantly income-generating recorded crime rates in local areas in South Australia,” the study said.
The concentration of gaming machines in socio-economically disadvantaged areas “may add disproportionately to their already significant social problems”, it said.
Until now there had been much conjecture about whether gambling was linked to crime.
Parts of the Journal of Gambling Studies can be accessed through Springer or through Google Scholar
6/13/2007: Australia - Seniors residences on casino sites
Pokie Palaces move into aged care
The chief executive officer of Dee Why RSL, Grant Easterby, said the the club had 145 people on a waiting list for 93 seniors’ units, which would be right next door to the club. He hoped it would increase patronage.
“We believe it will be profitable,” he said, but added: “I think the days are gone where the poker machines will subsidise everything. We can generate revenue on an ongoing basis which allows us to reinvest back into the club and the community.”
Clubs NSW said clubs were already subject to responsible gambling provisions and many were already located close to homes. The industry said it had not lobbied the Government for the change.
Figures from the Department of Gaming and Racing show that at least 260 registered clubs have closed in NSW in the past 10 years, almost 30 of those in the CBD. While poker machine revenue grew by 6.2 per cent for inner city hotels in the past year, the gambling revenue for inner city clubs grew by just 0.1 per cent.
Under the proposed new laws, club land would have to pass a site compatibility test to ensure the development fitted with local environmental planning laws. Clubs would still need to submit a development application.
Rob Lynch, an expert in leisure sport and tourism at the University of Technology, Sydney, said that while clubs provide valuable community services, “they also raise a lot of revenue for themselves and for the government through gambling”.
Perhaps the poker machines could spit out meal tickets occasionally? Just one meal ticket a day should be enough. A ticket for boiled potatoes and carrots, and a choice of desicated fish or rissoles, and some strong tea or coffee, so they can gamble away their retirement years without losing focus, or too much weight.
Dee Why RSL, and a number of other NSW clubs, already run “senior units”.
The government ignored the plummeting availability of housing for elderly people until it reached a crisis point, and now claims it has no choice but to allow the widespread privatisation of caring for those who cannot care for themselves, or afford to live in their own homes.
5/31/2007: Autralia offers help for problem gamblers
A NEW counselling service in Healesville and Yarra Junction is offering assistance to people affected by problem gambling.
Eastern Access Community Health (EACH) has operated the service in Lilydale for several years and with a full-time counsellor dealing with a case-load of between 40 and 50 people at any one time there was seen to be a demonstrated need for extending the service to Healesville and Yarra Junction.
Susan Jenkin, an experienced drug and alcohol counsellor, is now tackling the issues which manifest themselves in problem gambling.
She said while there are more than 14 legal ways to gamble in Victoria, nearly all the problem gamblers they see are related to pokies.
Healesville and Yarra Junction each have pokies venues at their local RSL sub-branches.
Ms Jenkin said problems gamblers have traditionally been in the 30 to 50 and 65 years plus age groups, but there is an increasing trend towards younger people coming in for help.
“By the time they come in for counselling extraordinary levels of damage have been done,” Ms Jenkin said.
“Many of them are aware they have a problem five or six years earlier but are reluctant to seek help because of the shame and the stigma.”
Her advice to problem gamblers is “if you’re not sure whether or not you have a problem, get on to it early before things get too bad”.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Activism, Addiction and Recovery, Australia, General 
Administrator11/1/2005: Australia
With the Melbourne Cup just ended some quick facts about gambling in Australia:
…The average Australian now spends about $17 a week on gambling, which is 3.5 per cent of the average household budget.
…And the increase in spending on gambling still has legs, growing by 5.5 per cent in the past year when total household consumption only grew by 3.3 per cent.
…Of the $17 Aussie’s punted each week, only $2 was put on the races with the bulk spent on lotto, pools, poker machines and in casinos…
8/5/2005: Addicted gamblers could teach the addicted states a thing or two.
When it comes to problem gambling, our state politicians seem resigned to the way things are. They tell us it’s a serious problem, and point to the things they are doing about it, which basically amount to a bit of fiddling at the edges.
The pollies’ task is a tough one: be seen to be addressing problem gambling, all the while keeping the gaming industry on side and filling the state coffers. It’s a case of rob Peter, pay Paul, then tell Peter you’re very concerned about the situation and here’s a 24-hour number he can call.
Across Australia, the story is much the same. There is sober talk in parliaments of capping the number of poker machines, and of moving machines from one suburb to another. Other measures are introduced — smoking restrictions at venues, brighter lighting, machines made to display the time.
But one need only look at how much money the states continue to make from gambling to see that these measures are doing next to nothing to tackle the problem.
In NSW, gambling rakes in about $1.5 billion in revenue; in Victoria, $1.4 billion. Meanwhile, independent research estimates that 42 per cent of all gambling revenue comes from problem gamblers.
Here is an industry built on the back of suffering, that thrives by attaching itself like a leech to loneliness, depression and desperation.
There are about 300,000 problem gamblers in Australia. And for every problem gambler, at least five other people are affected — partners, children, parents, siblings, friends. All up, that’s at least 1½ million Australians whose lives are worse off — emotionally, mentally, financially — for the existence of poker machines. Just how high does that figure have to go?
6/26/2005: Rugby player speaking up
Queensland rugby player Steve Price began gambling in 1994.
It started when he put $10 in a poker machine and walked away with $250.
He was hooked. Friends intervened in 2000
Price said his biggest fear throughout the ordeal was possibly losing wife Jo and children Jamie, Kassey and Riley.
“I basically just got the courage to spill the beans and then we went about ways of making sure I didn’t have money, other than for what I needed,” Price said.
“I got a signatory on my account and if I needed money I had to put it by him what the money was for.
“I was on a budget of so much per week and Jo and I set up a joint account so she could watch the money as well.
“It had gone on for a couple of years, we’d got behind on our mortgage and stuff.
“Bob Hagan and Garry Hughes were unreal. Bullfrog (former Canterbury administrator Peter Moore) gave me some words of wisdom, basically saying you’re not going to win on the poker machines.
“Matty Ryan and I would often go up to the club and put $100 or $200 in each.
“Things have changed dramatically since then.”
A poll in Rugby Week magazine shows about 50% of NRL players know another player that has a gambling problem.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Addiction and Recovery, Australia
Administrator6/26/2005: Rugby player speaking up
Queensland rugby player Steve Price began gambling in 1994.
It started when he put $10 in a poker machine and walked away with $250.
He was hooked. Friends intervened in 2000
Price said his biggest fear throughout the ordeal was possibly losing wife Jo and children Jamie, Kassey and Riley.
“I basically just got the courage to spill the beans and then we went about ways of making sure I didn’t have money, other than for what I needed,” Price said.
“I got a signatory on my account and if I needed money I had to put it by him what the money was for.
“I was on a budget of so much per week and Jo and I set up a joint account so she could watch the money as well.
“It had gone on for a couple of years, we’d got behind on our mortgage and stuff.
“Bob Hagan and Garry Hughes were unreal. Bullfrog (former Canterbury administrator Peter Moore) gave me some words of wisdom, basically saying you’re not going to win on the poker machines.
“Matty Ryan and I would often go up to the club and put $100 or $200 in each.
“Things have changed dramatically since then.”
A poll in Rugby Week magazine shows about 50% of NRL players know another player that has a gambling problem.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Addiction and Recovery, Australia
Administrator6/12/2005: Australia Slots
Australia slot machines will soon be fitted with pop ups to remind gamblers how long they have been playing.
The warning will be incorporated into the coin-operated gaming machines in New South Wales state as part of measures to control problem gambling, the Daily Telegraph said.
It said the state government had accepted most recommendations of an independent tribunal examining the issue.
Other recommendations — such as preventing machines from accepting 100 dollar (76 US) and 50 dollar notes and limiting cash withdrawals from ATM machines in bars — would be discussed with gaming ministers from other states and the federal government.
The Telegraph said new laws in New South Wales state will also ban “offensive or indecent” prizes after one Sydney bar last year offered male winners an erotic massage.
Rows of poker machines are a feature of almost every bar, with ATM machines conveniently at hand for punters who run short of cash.
