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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 06 Hansard (Thursday, 24 June 2004) . . Page.. 2695 ..

continues to battle to provide various dimensions of community, including sport, which seems to be the one that gets frowned upon a little.

If you are fair dinkum about charitable and social welfare, I think that you should come into this house, move an amendment to the act, increase the tax by two per cent on poker machines and then redistribute that income according to some formula or process or through some trust. I do believe that we should allow clubs that have been set up by volunteers to promote cultural, ethnic or sporting activity to contribute to that activity and be recognised as part of the community—not a lesser part of the community than outright charity, but a genuine part of the community.

Some of them are near the edge and, as I said earlier in this debate, it is probable that for at least an interim period they will get closer to the edge when smoking bans come into play. I do think that this proposal is overly prescriptive and restrictive in terms of what clubs might do. A lot of these clubs are run by volunteers who put work into trying to promote their particular dimension of the community, and we need them. Instead of saying that that is a lesser activity, they ought to be lauded for it as opposed to being somehow put in a position where they feel that they have to apologise for using poker machine revenue or they have to apologise for supporting sport. I think we really ought to take a different attitude.

MR STEFANIAK (6.27): Mr Speaker, I certainly agree with what the Treasurer has said. Indeed, attempts have been made both here and elsewhere to divide up and categorise how clubs should do their thing. That might happen to an extent in New South Wales. I think that the requirement there is something like 0.6 per cent and 0.9 per cent of revenue for certain things and the clubs there have all sorts of difficulties in terms of actually divvying it up.

We had this argument several years ago. I can remember when it was proposed that we do something along the lines of what Ms Dundas is doing now—you were not here then, Ms Dundas—and it caused huge angst among the clubs. As Mr Quinlan has rightly said, these clubs have all been set up with articles of association. Most of them have been set up with some specific aims in mind. As I said earlier, sport is terribly important. It is one of the main reasons that a lot of these clubs exist and they do a wonderful job for the community.

In terms of looking at charitable things, they help people who otherwise would not get help. They help kids who are at risk by providing good sporting opportunities for them. They should be recognised for the excellent work they do. A whole lot of the clubs would not know a football if they fell over one and are much more interested in supporting other avenues, be they charitable or artistic pursuits. I think that it all pans out pretty well, with some $15 million in contributions being made last year above the seven per cent or whatever it is the clubs are required to make. I think that we should give credit where credit is due.

I must say that I am pleased to see more contributions going to other pursuits as well. In fact, the community contribution section is deliberately broad to enable clubs to give money for a broad spectrum of very useful community purposes, ranging from sport to artistic pursuits, charities, assisting people in need, and assisting certain ethnic dance groups or whatever, and I do not think that we should be prescriptive. I think that the

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