Page 2819 - Week 07 - Thursday, 7 June 2012
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that it brings people in and they eat food or have a drink while they are there, or they make the fees from withdrawals. They believe it will substantially affect their business and the business of other small clubs. So in 8, 9 and 10, we have said that there should be exemptions and that we may have to legislate for that to occur.
The report then goes on to look at a number of issues. In relation to the cap, as the chair of the review said, the cap itself is a simplistic policy instrument—and it is simplistic—in what is a very complicated issue. We have more machines than anybody else per capita, but they are not used as much as those in some of the other jurisdictions. We were given some evidence about the perverse outcomes of reducing accessibility. The commission said:
On the one hand, greater accessibility stimulates demand, with the result that some gamblers are exposed to risks that were originally muted or not present.
On the other hand, a population that already includes problem gamblers will be typified by higher expenditure levels … encouraging greater supply of gaming machines in those areas. To the extent that this is the case, reducing accessibility in that area may result in greater utilisation of existing machines or shifts in the location of demand, without reducing harm.
This is the problems when you have a simplistic approach. All you do is shift the problem or not affect the problem at all. They go on to say:
It is probable that both effects are present in such local area studies, with the relative size of the two competing effects likely to depend on the pre-existing level of accessibility and the nature of the host communities. It is likely that the second effect is dominant once accessibility rises above a certain threshold.
ClubsACT, as you would expect, had something to say about that. They came and said:
… one definite consequence of reducing the number of machines in the ACT is that the intensity of use of the remaining machines will go up. So we might move down the league table on the per-capita list but it will simply mean that we will move up the ladder on the intensity of use measure. Should that really be our objective here?
That says that all we are doing is shuffling the deckchairs. We know that a discussion paper said:
… the ACT had the highest number of machines on a per capita basis but an average profit per gaming machine of $34,850, well below the national average of $55,054 … Per capita expenditure on poker machines in the ACT is $554, which is slightly higher than the national average. However, the expenditure by ACT residents on gaming machines as a proportion of ACT household disposable income stands at 1.5 per cent, slightly below the national average of 1.6 per cent and well below the NSW average of 2.3 per cent.
I quote those figures because you cannot just use the averages and say we are bad. You have got to take into account all of the data that has been presented before you and come to a reasonable conclusion.
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