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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 6 Hansard (24 May) . . Page.. 1734 ..
MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):
access that they obtain will be, of course, not to regulated Internet gambling providers but to unregulated providers. It will be to unregulated providers in places like the Caribbean, Bermuda, Asia and other small and out of the way places where regulation is non-existent. These sites are the ones that will take the money of people. They will not care how many hours a day these people might gamble on the Internet. They will not necessarily be able to provide a very good service to people in terms of paying winnings. They will not necessarily be an honest and reputable provider of the service, and people will get ripped off. Those people who are problem gamblers in particular will have absolutely no safety net under them as they proceed to satisfy their addictions.
I do not believe that we should leave people in that parlous position. I believe that if we have got the power to be able to prevent the harm that is associated with excessive gambling, we should do something about it. Not only do I believe that, but once upon a time Kerrie Tucker believed that as well. I quote from the speech that Ms Tucker gave on 25 June 1998 in support of the government's Interactive Gambling Act.
Ms Tucker: I have already dealt with that. Why don't you listen. It needs to be monitored and we need to-
MR HUMPHRIES: Ms Tucker, will you please put a sock in it and listen to what I have to say. I know it is painful, but listen to what I have to say. Ms Tucker said:
The Greens will be supporting this legislation ... I think this bill is really important and I congratulate the Government for bringing it forward. It will need ongoing monitoring and possible amendments down the track ... the Greens and I are happy with that because I believe that the nature of the industry requires them.
That is, the amendments. She continued:
Legislation is necessary because this area of gambling just cannot be left unregulated.
What Ms Tucker is saying today is: "Let's leave it unregulated. Let's freeze this legislation, let's not proceed, let's not worry about it going forward."
I do not generally quote the Premier of Victoria, Mr Bracks, but yesterday he put out a release on this subject. To paraphrase him, he said that online gambling is utterly inevitable because this is a medium which anybody who wants to get hold of it can, and there is not a damned thing we can do about it. And he is right.
I am not saying, the government has never said, that there are no problems with Internet gambling. What we have said is there is a problem with trying to stop Internet gambling. If we are going to make sure in particular that Australians who might be considering betting on such sites are not ripped off and are protected if they have an excessive gambling habit, then we should be putting in place regulation which ensures that those protections in place. If we freeze the licences for a long period, as Ms Tucker suggests in her motion, we will end up denying people that protection. That is simply nonsense.
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