Thursday, 9 June 2022

Bills

Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Ms HORNE:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Ms RYAN (Euroa) (10:12): I welcome the opportunity today to rise to speak on the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. From the outset let me make it clear that the opposition will not be opposing this legislation. I think it is an incremental step forward in an effort to ensure integrity at Crown Casino and with the casino operator. But I do not think that we should pretend that this bill is before the Parliament because of the government; rather, I would argue that it is here in spite of it.

I have said before and I will say again that the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence, which precipitated the arrival of this bill, was a royal commission that the Premier never wanted to have. This is a government which at a broad level faces very deep questions about its integrity on many fronts, and this is but one of those areas where there are serious questions about the government’s interaction with the regulator, the regulator’s interaction with the casino operator and the government’s interaction with the casino operator itself. The Premier, as we know, is before two, possibly three, IBAC investigations, and we have seen that the government has nobbled the powers and the funding of integrity bodies like IBAC and the Ombudsman. And we have seen in recent days that the Labor chair of the IBAC committee has even attempted to shut down public viewing of hearings with the IBAC Commissioner for fear that it would reflect poorly on the Premier. We have seen of course the red shirts affair, which was described by the Ombudsman as an ‘artifice’. So I think on many fronts the government faces very deep questions on these issues, and when it came to investigating years of allegations of illegal behaviour at Crown and investigating concerns about how the casino operator was managing that precinct, the Premier just resisted, resisted and resisted those calls and proved himself to be very reluctant to have any kind of examination of those issues. It did not come from our side of the chamber; it came from the three former gaming ministers, who told Four Corners that they believed the Premier was too close to Crown.

So we arrive here today discussing this bill after in fact it was the opposition who proposed a select committee in the upper house—in the other place—where we sought to examine not just Crown but also the regulator and the government’s interactions with Crown. It was on the eve of a vote in the upper house on those terms of reference to establish that select committee that the Premier finally agreed to call a royal commission into Crown, but as we know, the royal commission was given very narrow terms of reference, and it was pointed solely to look at the casino operator, not in fact to examine any of those issues with the regulator or indeed with the government. I have always been of the view, as I think many people who have observed this process closely have been, that that was done very deliberately by the government to direct the spotlight away from the government’s interactions with the regulator and with Crown and to put it firmly back to the casino operator itself.

So as a result of that process we had the royal commission, which delivered 33 recommendations. I do make the point that there are a number of those recommendations which still have not been delivered upon by the government. They include a number of recommendations to crack down on money laundering and the structure of the casino operator and also recommendations about the responsible service of gambling. So they do go to very serious matters that went to the heart of the royal commission. I want to point to one. For example, the royal commission recommended that a direction be given to Crown that on or by 30 June this year it must keep and maintain a single account, as approved by the regulator, at an authorised deposit-taking institution in the state for use for all banking transactions by patrons. The deadline for that, as I said, is now less than a month away, but we still have no visibility on whether in fact that has occurred and whether the government has given those instructions to Crown.

The commission also recommended a direction be given to Crown pursuant to section 23(1) of the Casino Control Act 1991 requiring it to retain all security and surveillance CCTV footage for a period of 12 months. Again there is nothing to inform the Parliament as to whether that has actually occurred, and that recommendation is particularly relevant to the heart of this bill and some of the changes that this bill makes to the functions of inspectors. So I would hope that perhaps as government members seek to address this bill they may look to informing the Parliament as to whether those directions have now indeed been given to Crown.

One of the primary purposes of this bill is to separate the functions of liquor and gaming between two separate regulators. Clause 22 amends the Liquor Control Reform Act 1998 to establish a new liquor regulator, the Victorian Liquor Commission. Clauses 11 to 16, 37 to 43 and 45 to 62 amend the Gambling Regulation Act 2003 to reflect the separation between gambling and liquor regulation. The risk I see with the establishment of the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission is that it risks being little more than a name change and a shuffling of the deck chairs within the regulator. I think whilst we are dealing with enabling legislation here to establish those changes, the devil really is going to be in the implementation and the structure of the new commission. Some stakeholders have actually already raised concerns with me that nothing has changed within the regulator after the royal commission’s findings. I understand that there has been an exodus of experienced staff from the Victorian Commission for Gambling and Liquor Regulation (VCGLR) in recent times, the CEO being but one. I understand that a number of redundancy packages were in fact offered and the most experienced inspector now employed at the regulator has only 18 months experience. So that raises some very real red flags about the ability of the regulator to do its job, and I think serious questions need to be answered by the government as to why there has been such a massive turnover of frontline staff within the regulator. In fact this is some recent feedback that I have received from people who understand the sector well. This is a direct quote: ‘Inspectors have told me that casino and gaming are on the backburner. They also said that the numbers just do not stack up on gaming and on the casino side. They are saying they only have 12 inspectors to cover gaming throughout the entire state and 14 to cover the casino. There are not enough people on the ground’.

We know that last year the government asked Ian Freckelton QC to review the VCGLR, particularly after a number of gaming inspectors spoke out on Four Corners and raised their concerns about the fact that behaviour they witnessed on the floor of Crown was not investigated by the regulator and that they felt that their concerns about loansharking, money laundering and illegal drug dealing were repeatedly ignored. The Freckelton inquiry was told during its interviews with staff members at the VCGLR that at the time of the establishment of the regulator in 2012 there were approximately 95 operational inspectors who were conducting gambling and liquor auditing, and that included the casino. This has reduced to a total of between approximately 20 and 30 inspectors, with just eight inspectors assigned to the casino.

They were the findings of Ian Freckelton, who was appointed by the government to review the VCGLR. We also know that at the time of the Auditor-General’s report in 2017 there were about 40 operational inspectors at the VCGLR. So what we have seen is a huge cut in inspector numbers by Labor, and the legislation before us does nothing to change that. I think it is very curious when you think that most areas of the public sector—and the Premier’s department, Department of Premier and Cabinet, is certainly one—have expanded to a great size, but then you have got a regulator that is fulfilling very important obligations to ensure the integrity of gaming in this state that has found that its frontline roles have been drastically cut back. I do think that that is something that the government needs to examine closely.

Catherine Myers, who was the former CEO of the VCGLR until she stepped down last year—departed late last year—told Mr Freckelton that one of the limitations that she faced as the CEO was the budget reductions that were imposed on the VCGLR, which meant that operationally it was difficult to run rosters 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and absorb the cuts while also meeting the targets set by the government. I find it extraordinary that in light of her concerns about the operational budget of the VCGLR and her inability to actually fulfil the obligation of properly regulating the casino with the budget she was given Labor would then further slash the budget of the regulator in this year’s budget.

Page 316 of budget paper 3 shows that the output funding for liquor and gaming will reduce in this coming year from $86.1 million to $76.1 million—a cut of more than $10 million. You really have to ask how the regulator is actually going to achieve material change on the ground, on the floor of the casino, if the government is in fact stripping resources away from the regulator and reducing inspector numbers further when you have got the most senior levels of that organisation already saying, ‘We’re at bare bones and we’re struggling to do this job’, and when you have got someone like Ian Freckelton telling us that inspector numbers have been drastically reduced whilst the Andrews government has been in power. It is hard to arrive at any conclusion other than that splitting the commission is little more than a PR exercise for the government when they are actively cutting the organisation’s budget. There is clearly no intention to actually increase those inspector numbers on the ground. I think if anyone is interested in the government’s response to that, they may like to go back and read the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee transcript of the minister where she struggled to explain why indeed the government is cutting funding for the portfolio.

This bill delivers on two of the 33 recommendations that the royal commission made. The first relates to the functions of inspectors, and that goes to recommendation 17 of the royal commission. The commissioner recommended that inspectors be given the functions to ascertain whether money laundering or loansharking is taking place or whether illicit drugs are being sold, and he recommended that they be given the ability to make an exclusion order, where appropriate, to withdraw a person’s licence to remain on the casino premises and also any other functions that might be prescribed by regulation. I think why Commissioner Finkelstein made these recommendations is important. The royal commission actually concluded that staff at Crown do not or historically have not taken sufficient action to deter or to prevent illegal conduct, even when it is happening in plain sight.

Victoria Police used to maintain a 24/7 presence at the casino through a dedicated unit called the casino crime unit. That unit was actually disbanded when the current Premier was the gaming minister back in 2006. That unit was responsible for the collection of intelligence, for investigating suspected international cheats and for investigating money laundering, counterfeiting and other suspicious activity, and it provided a primary response to the day-to-day criminal conduct that occurred within the casino complex. By disbanding this unit you could argue that the government effectively allowed Crown to regulate itself, and it was certainly a big step to a greater self-regulation model if you like. But it is because this unit no longer exists that the royal commission recommended additional powers for inspectors. During the course of the royal commission a police officer who was based with the organised crime intelligence unit actually gave evidence about money laundering that has been occurring in recent times at Crown. The officer stated that:

‘there [was] money laundering at the casino on a daily basis’

He said:

‘[outside] junket programs … we observed a lot of lower level money laundering or suspected money laundering’

‘individuals had a certain amount of cash with them … [for example] in plastic bags … going to the casino’

He said—I should say he or she; we do not know the gender of this particular officer:

a particular type of container in which the cash was placed was ‘a very big indicator [of money laundering] for us’

‘there is a high probability [that certain people carrying money into the casino] are just money runners … working for a money laundering syndicate’.

So the effect of the changes we have before us now is to put far greater responsibility and far greater obligations on the inspectors who are employed by the regulator.

We supported the royal commission’s recommendations, but again the sticking point will be in how these changes are implemented. I think it is all well and good to expand the remit of inspectors, but that really does need to be accompanied by appropriate training. I think, given the current state of flux in the regulator, the staff turnover that I mentioned and Labor’s cuts to inspector numbers, it is very difficult to see how just expanding the functions of inspectors is going to solve the bigger issue. At the end of the day I think it is important that inspectors can use these powers, but there have to actually be enough of them on the gaming floor in the first place to be able to observe that behaviour.

I want to go back a little bit in time. In 1982 the Victorian government appointed a former federal court judge, Xavier Connor QC, to inquire into and recommend whether casinos should be established in Victoria—it was when the debate first started to occur in Victoria. Xavier Connor ultimately recommended against the establishment of casinos in Victoria, but he said that, were they to be legalised, they would need to be very highly regulated and there would need to be a very high level of regulatory control. Now, while everyone remembers the footage of Jeff Kennett as he opened Crown Casino, it was in fact Joan Kirner during her time as Premier who legalised both casinos and electronic gaming machines.

Mr D O’Brien interjected.

Ms RYAN: But I do digress, member for Gippsland South. Connor recommended that the government appoint inspectors, so that was the first time that that recommendation had been made. He did not believe that a casino should be legalised in Victoria, but he said, ‘If you do do it, you need to appoint inspectors and they need to have investigative, surveillance and auditing skills’—a team of inspectors with those qualities that have very high integrity and skill.

When the Melbourne casino was actually opened, when Jeff Kennett was Premier, the Victoria Police crime unit that I referred to earlier was also established in addition to the work of those inspectors. So you had a dual track, if you like—you had permanent police presence via a permanent unit stationed at Crown, which was doing a lot of the intelligence work and a lot of the work to stamp out crime at the casino, and then you also had this team of skilled inspectors. That police presence, that permanent police presence as a dedicated casino unit, is no longer there, but effectively what the legislation before us now does is expand the role of those inspectors. I would certainly argue that in recent years the job of an inspector has not become less complex, and I would make the observation that it is a very big ask to require an inspector to take on the functions that are prescribed in the legislation that is before the house as well as to maintain those skills that Xavier Connor pointed to in 1983 when he first recommended the establishment of those inspectors. It is a very big and a very broad job with exceptional challenges. So I draw back to the fact that if now the most experienced inspector in the regulator has just 18 months experience, that is a great concern and it raises a real red flag for me about how the government is actually going to ensure integrity on the gaming floor at Crown.

A further recommendation that this bill seeks to implement is recommendation 18 from the royal commission, which calls for changes to the powers of inspectors. The commissioner recommended that inspectors have free and unfettered access to all parts of the casino, to all surveillance equipment used by the casino operator and to all the books and records of the casino, and he further recommended that interference with inspectors’ performance of their functions becomes a strict liability offence, which this bill delivers on, which carries a significant penalty; I believe it is 120 penalty units that the bill imposes. I think these changes are certainly important, particularly in light of those concerns raised by inspectors within the Four Corners report, but more important is a willingness to actually use those powers when they are required. Again I draw back to that Four Corners report, where one inspector said that Crown tended to believe that they should have control and virtually had a self-regulatory model and they would have been quite happy to see the gaming inspectors out of there. Another inspector, Barry McGann, who actually worked at the VCGLR until 2008, said:

In regards to auditing and Crown giving us the information, they’re definitely—they’re feeding us the information they want us to see.

Yet another, Danny Lakasas, who worked at the regulator until last year, pointed out that the inspectors already have coercive powers under existing legislation where they can interview people, they can demand CCTV footage, demand the production of documents or seize footage. But the concerns of those inspectors related not so much to the powers that were at their disposal but rather the willingness of the regulator to actually act upon them and investigate those concerns.

Clause 9 of this bill inserts new section 108 into the Casino Control Act 1991 to give inspectors greater access to the casino, including its security equipment, books and records. But I do note that in seeking to implement this recommendation the government is actually requiring inspectors to give notice in writing in order to allow the inspector to access and operate the security and surveillance facilities for the casino and to access, inspect or take copies of or extracts from books or records of the casino operator. Some of the former inspectors that I have spoken to have raised concerns about this requirement. In their view it has been a particular problem in the past because it gives the casino time to hide and manipulate what is provided to inspectors—remember that these are highly experienced inspectors who have many, many years on the floor at Crown—and in their view an inspector must be able to walk in and request the information on the spot so there is no opportunity for the casino to destroy, manipulate or change information. They say that they used to be able to walk into Crown’s surveillance department and do that; they would be provided with the footage immediately. It was more, in their observation, where things changed within the regulator that Crown became more bolshie and started pushing back on those requests. So their view is not so much that there are gaps in the existing legislation but rather that there needs to be a willingness within the regulator to exert the power that it has.

With that said, I would challenge the government to explain why they are putting limitations on the level of access for inspectors and why they are putting that requirement into legislation that they do in fact need to first notify Crown in writing of any request for books or documents or CCTV footage. I also would really like the government to explain why they have taken that decision given it was not a recommendation from the royal commission but rather the royal commission made a recommendation, as I noted earlier, that Crown should be directed under existing powers within the Casino Control Act to retain a copy of all security footage for a minimum of 12 months.

In conclusion, I guess I want to finish with the observation that I made earlier that the sticking point and the success of these changes is ultimately going to be in how they are implemented. The Parliament can grant some additional powers to inspectors and we can split the regulator into gaming and liquor, but ultimately it is going to come down to how the government chooses to resource the regulator. As I pointed out, I have grave concerns that that is going in the opposite direction—that in fact the regulator is having its budget cut even further and that that is likely to result in further reductions to inspector numbers when already we have evidence before us from both the former CEO of the regulator and also from Ian Freckelton to suggest that inspector numbers have been drastically wound back in recent years.

Again, that gutting of the regulator really does lead Victorians to ask why. Why was the Premier so incredibly reluctant to call any serious investigation into Crown? Why has this government cut the regulator back so that there are some shifts that have gone unfilled at the casino? Why are they even this year—after all of the concerns that have been raised about Crown, after all the findings that have come to light through both the New South Wales Bergin inquiry and Ray Finkelstein’s royal commission here in Victoria—now further reducing the budget of the regulator by another $10 million? Those things all remain very significant questions that the government has to answer. I think it would not be a stretch for Victorians to actually ask what is going to change here because it is one thing to give these powers, but more important than that, we need to ensure that the regulator is properly resourced to do its job.

Mr TAK (Clarinda) (10:38): I am delighted to rise today to speak on the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022, another important bill that will continue to deliver the recommendations of the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence and strengthen regulatory oversight of our gambling environment through the full establishment of the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission (VGCCC). Over the past 18 months we have seen this government’s commitment to responsible gambling and regulation of the industry. We have seen this commitment through the announcement and delivery of the royal commission as well as the procurement of an independent policy review of casino regulations in August 2021, which led to the establishment of the new dedicated casino and gambling regulator, the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission.

I also had the privilege of contributing to the debate on the Casino and Gambling Legislation Amendment Bill 2021, which came into operation on 1 January 2022 and commenced the transition to the VGCCC whilst also implementing the first tranche of recommendations from the royal commission. The VGCCC will strengthen oversight of the casino and improve harm minimisation, and this is particularly relevant to my community in Clarinda, where gambling and gambling-related harm is a serious issue and is challenging for many.

It is too often those that can least afford it that suffer from gambling, and that is true in the City of Greater Dandenong. Greater Dandenong is one of four local government areas that make up the Clarinda electorate, and according to the census data, it is second in Victoria for socio-economic disadvantage. Despite this, over $350 000 was spent at the casino per day throughout 2020–21 and over $72 million for the year, which is the third-highest expenditure in Victoria. This is a cruel reality—that those that can least afford it are the most vulnerable.

I know from my time as a councillor at the City of Greater Dandenong that gambling causes a great deal of harm to the health and wellbeing of many of my constituents through financial stress, relationship breakdown, family violence and mental illness, and that also comes with gambling addiction. I know that this is particularly so in many of our multicultural and culturally and linguistically diverse communities, so it is important that we continue to remind ourselves of this harm and we continue to work together to address and mitigate this harm wherever we can.

The Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation does some amazing work in partnership with communities across Victoria to inform people about the risk of gambling and to provide support to those who need it most, including those affected by someone else’s gambling. The foundation has funded a number of councils, including the City of Greater Dandenong, to implement the Libraries After Dark program. The program is focused on reaching at-risk communities and those most vulnerable to social isolation, things also known to be risk factors for gambling harm. Springvale and Dandenong libraries are avid participants in this project, delivering workshops, film screenings, games nights and more, so you can just pop in for a free cuppa or a snack and make some new friends there. It is a wonderful program, mostly on Thursday evenings, and sessions this week are fully booked. Springvale Library will host sessions on electrical wire jewellery with Vivian Qiu, and their session is every Thursday. For everyone feeling isolated I recommend, suggest, urge and encourage them to get involved.

There is also a foundation prevention partnerships program which funds the Reducing Gambling-related Harm in CALD Communities project. This project aims to design and implement a community-led prevention strategy with culturally and linguistically diverse communities and associations to reduce the level of gambling-related harm in the City of Greater Dandenong—a very important initiative. The foundation prevention partnership program is funding the Engaging Cambodian Buddhist Temples in Gambling Prevention Partnerships project. The aim of this project is to build the capacity of Cambodian community leaders, including monks, in Melbourne’s south-east to raise awareness of gambling harm within the Cambodian community and to engage community members with the issue, which we know sometimes is taboo and something that is not spoken about. I know that the project has delivered some really important services and outcomes for the Cambodian community, and I would like to say thank you to Mora Gibbings, welfare coordinator at the Cambodian Association of Victoria, who manages that project. She is a strong advocate for her community and has done an enormous amount of work to address gambling-related harm and family violence in our community.

Returning to the substance of the bill, the bill makes amendments to four acts. The first of those is the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission Act 2011, also known as the VGCCC act. The relevant amendment will facilitate the full establishment of the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission in legislation—namely, the amendment will establish the organisational structure and governance of the new VGCCC and provide for the commissioner to have particular skills and experience, such as regulatory experience and financial qualifications; introduce a new objective which reflects the VGCCC’s role in gambling and harm minimisation; clarify the VGCCC’s functions, including informing the public about gambling policy and undertaking activities to minimise gambling harm; provide the minister with the power to issue written directions to the VGCCC relating to its objectives and functions; and, most importantly, ensure that decisions are made at the appropriate level by making certain functions non-delegable.

These are more important changes that will strengthen oversight of the casino and improve harm minimisation. There are also other amendments to the Casino Control Act 1991, the CCA, which will introduce a new mandatory reporting function so that inspectors must report to the VGCCC any observations of money laundering, loan sharks or the sale of illicit drugs; give casino inspectors greater access to surveillance equipment, books, records and other documentation; allow the VGCCC to accept a written undertaking where there is a breach or a potential breach of the CCA or the Gambling Regulation Act 2003 or in relation to any further matter where the VGCCC has a power or function; and enable the VGCCC to take disciplinary action against the casino operator following a single breach of the operator’s responsible gambling code of conduct. These are all important changes.

Finally, there are changes to the Liquor Control Reform Act 1998 which will establish a new Victorian Liquor Commission under the LCRA within the Department of Justice and Community Safety. And lastly, there are provisions for relevant savings and transitional provisions to implement the establishment of the new regulations. These are comprehensive and important changes that will continue to implement the recommendations of the royal commission, strengthen oversight and improve harm minimisation. These are important changes for my community, and I know that my community would support this. I commend the bill to the house.

Ms McLEISH (Eildon) (10:47): I rise to make a contribution on the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. I want to begin by noting the comprehensive review and assessment that the Shadow Minister for Gaming and Liquor Regulation, the member for Euroa, provided to the house not so long ago. This could be a good news story, but sadly we have had so many issues with the casino that the government has been forced to bring in a number of bills to address some of the issues, and I will certainly be going through some of those issues.

We know the casino is part of the heart of the Crown complex, and that complex at Southbank is an enormous gathering place for many people, with the restaurants and with the fun and activities that they have in and around the casino. So it is not just the gaming machines and tables that draw people there; the entire entertainment complex is very important to Melbourne. It is very important to tourism in Melbourne. I note that prior to COVID it had some 19 million visits per annum. Many of those people are locals in Melbourne, Victoria. People will come from interstate, and they will stay at a number of the hotels that are there. Certainly we know that they come internationally, and here is where some of the problems begin with some of the practices that have been going on there.

I have been lucky enough on a couple of occasions to have had a behind-the-scenes tour of the complex, and there are a number of exceptionally impressive elements of how it runs. Their training program, the training that they provide for people that are working on tables, for security and for people working in a number of the areas, restaurants and catering—I understand that within the industry it provides some of the best 5-star training that young chefs or people who are going to be working in the hospitality sector can get. I think it is in recognition of the important role that the casino, and the complex, plays in Melbourne’s economy and certainly the tourism sector that it has continued to survive rather than have its licence pulled from it.

Running a casino cannot be easy. It is a lot more than fun and games, and it has a lot of complexities about it, because when we are starting to look at things like money laundering and problem gambling, it is how you get on top of those things. When I visited, I saw some of the work that they were doing with problem gambling, but clearly that has been far from adequate, and a lot more work needs to be done in this area. I think that the government have really dropped the ball on this for quite some time.

The purpose of the bill that we have before us is to amend the Casino Control Act 1991, the Gambling Regulation Act 2003, the Liquor Control Reform Act 1998 and the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission Act 2011, so there are quite a number of acts that are tied up in this. We know that the bill also makes further arrangements for the regulator, the VGCCC—as we said, the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission—and it implements the government’s decision to separate gambling and liquor regulation and to establish the new regulator for liquor, and that is something that has been there in the past. This will be creating the Victorian Liquor Commission, the VLC. The amendments of this bill will transfer all aspects of liquor regulation, which is currently undertaken by the VGCCC, to the new liquor commission.

I want to talk about the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence. Actually, no, I will go back a step. I want to start with the casino. It was established at the World Trade Centre in 1994 and at Southbank in 1997. We know prior to that that it was the Kirner government that legalised casinos and electronic gaming machines. So we have had for quite a considerable period, in a different way, gambling in Victoria, which has been known around the world. When you look at what has been going on around the world and the challenges that they have faced, it was something that we very much needed to be in control of. What happened was we had the Bergin report in New South Wales. The Bergin inquiry found that Crown facilitated millions of dollars to be laundered through a bank account of a subsidiary and Crown Melbourne allowed operators with links to organised crime to arrange for junket players to gamble at the casino. These were very, very serious allegations, and it has been very disappointing that the government really did not want to do much here and were actually dragged kicking and screaming to the royal commission.

Ray Finkelstein AO, QC, the commissioner, handed down his final report on 15 October last year, and he made 33 recommendations. As I said earlier, he stopped short of cancelling Crown’s licence because it would have caused such harm to Victoria’s economy and so many associated third parties. The government has given in-principle support to the remaining 24 recommendations after the first tranche of the legislation, which went through last year. I want to quote from the royal commission:

Within a very short time, the Commission discovered that for many years Crown Melbourne had engaged in conduct that is, in a word, disgraceful. This is a convenient shorthand for describing conduct that was variously illegal, dishonest, unethical and exploitative.

That is pretty damaging. Another quote:

Crown Melbourne had for years held itself out as having a world’s best approach to problem gambling. Nothing can be further from the truth. The Commission heard many distressing stories from people whose lives were ruined by gambling but whose situation might have been improved if casino staff had carried out their obligations under Crown Melbourne’s Gambling Code.

In January this year the Labor government walked away from its promise to implement all of the recommendations, and as I said, they had avoided a royal commission at every opportunity. It only went through when the upper house proposed forming a committee to inquire into Crown’s regulator and the government’s interactions with Crown.

In 2016—these are some of the findings; things that are really quite damaging—when Crown had 19 employees arrested in China for promoting gambling illegally, 16 of them were imprisoned and they did nothing to protect their staff. In 2017 the Auditor-General found that money laundering by high rollers at Crown was not being properly scrutinised by the regulator. In 2019 Fairfax and 60 Minutes ran an exposé on the casino, in which they alleged Crown was working with junket operators backed by organised crime. We only have to look at today’s newspapers, this week’s newspapers, to see continued concerns about overseas interests in money laundering operations and illicit drugs. We know that these problems are difficult; they are complex. It needs to be tackled properly. On Crown’s underpayment of casino tax, more than $61.5 million in back taxes has been repaid. We found also, as I said, that the Bergin inquiry made comments. So Crown was fined $80 million for the illegal practice of accepting Chinese bank cards to fund gambling, disguising the transactions as hotel expenses. These are very damaging.

Of course we have to have a look at the staff and the board there and their responsibilities. I acknowledge absolutely that running a casino, being on the board of a casino, is complex, and so the skill of the board members absolutely needs to be first class. They need to know and understand all the risks. They need to be aware of those risks, what is happening under their noses, and how to mitigate and deal with them.

With the legislation, it is great to have some legislation, but it is the implementation that is going to be where the real runs are made. If it is not implemented well, then there are real problems, because this legislation provides additional functions and powers for the regulator. Certainly we know that the budget has been cut—that was evidenced at the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee and through the budget papers themselves. If that means that there are less inspectors on the ground, well, some of these issues may actually grow rather than being tackled and knocked off.

We see now that the interim chair, Jane Halton, is the only board member to remain at the company. Xavier Walsh, the CEO, stepped down from his role last year, and they have had to have a new CEO. With this come enormous golden handshakes. The Australian Financial Review on 21 October outlined the extent of the millions and millions of dollars being paid in termination benefits. It is really quite staggering how many millions—tens of millions of dollars have had to be paid.

Whilst the opposition is not opposing this legislation, we do implore the government to make sure that it takes its role and the role of the regulator seriously so that we can avoid damaging the reputation of what could be a good organisation for Victoria and for gambling at the casino in this state.

Ms WARD (Eltham) (10:57): I also rise in support of this legislation, and I am glad to see it. Like probably a number of people in this place, I am not much of a gambler. I could not tell you the last time I was at Crown Casino. I could not tell you the last time I used a poker machine. It is not something that I consider to be that much of an enjoyable activity. I can see, though, how other people would. I can see the fun, the adrenaline, you never know, that luck of the draw. I guess we all experience that during cup week or the racing carnival season, where there is so much excitement that comes with it—what is going to happen? What is going to be the outcome? Can I make a little pot of gold out of my gamble? It is because it can escalate, it is because of that adrenaline rush, it is because of that psychological excitement that can come with gambling that we do need to have government intervention. We do need to have a number of mechanisms that actually help manage gambling in our community. This is one piece of legislation that this government has put forward to address the challenges that we have seen emerging or that we have uncovered with gambling in this state.

For a lot of us our experience of a casino is often on TV or it is in a movie. It often looks pretty glamorous. It is pretty cool; there are lots of people wearing pretty cool clothes. Often they are just trying to rip off the casino. We do not actually get to see a lot of the sadness and a lot of the trauma that can come with gambling problems. We do not get to see the families at home struggling to pay bills. We do not get to see the distress of being at a check-out and not being able to pay because your partner has sucked up all of the money from your account through an addiction to gambling—whether it be horses, whether it be pokies, whether it be a card table.

We as a government have got a responsibility to help manage this, so we established the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission. We know that the casino operator has to be held to account, and these are exactly the powers that the VGCCC will have. We want to minimise gambling-related harm, and we want that to be at the very core of the VGCCC. A number of speakers have spoken about the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence, and I imagine a number of speakers after me will continue to do so. In response to the royal commission we are now going to, with this bill, give new powers to casino inspectors and expand their role to include reporting certain activities that they see happening within the Melbourne casino. We know that over the last few years a lot of activities have been happening in the Melbourne casino which are not right and which need to be stopped. We know that they should not be happening. I thank the Minister for Consumer Affairs, Gaming and Liquor Regulation for the work that she and her team have done on this legislation.

And I thank her for the support that she has given to my petition to reduce gambling ads on TV. I have spoken in this place before about this petition, and now the federal election is over I can assure the gambling industry that I will continue to go in hard with my petition. I imagine I am not the Lone Ranger in this place who is sick to death of the saturation of gambling ads on TV. I am sick to death of the saturation of gambling ads in my Twitter feed whenever there is a football game on, and I am sick about the amount of children who think that gambling is normalised behaviour through these ads that we see on TV, that we have got kids who understand what betting odds look like and that we have got kids who think it is normal to bet on who will kick the first goal, how many goals will be kicked, who will be reported, who will go off and who will make the team, not just the final score at the end of the game. This is terrible behaviour for our kids to be subjected to, and they are subjected to it because of the saturation of ads that we have on our TVs that happen at all hours of the day.

The previous federal government had a responsibility. They were going to, under Malcolm Turnbull, come in and reduce the amount of gambling ads that we had on TV; before 8.30 at night they were not going to be on TV. This did not happen. They absolutely fell over, the federal coalition, when it came to controlling and monitoring gambling ads on TV, and I hope very much that the new Albanese government will step in and start to do something about it which will pick up this important work that the Liberals squibbed on—and they absolutely squibbed on it.

I thank the minister for supporting me in my petition and in helping to get it out there and for listening to me and understanding the concerns that I have got. It is astonishing but it is not surprising in my community how many people are signing this petition but also how many people have expressed and shared with me their frustration at how many gambling ads are on TV. I suspect that my contribution today will result in another member of the gambling industry emailing me and inviting me to meet with them to learn about all the great things that they are doing in the industry and the help that they are giving. One of the helps you can give is reducing your ads so you are not creating the harm in the first place. Do not email me and say that you want to catch up with me and talk through all the great work you are doing if you are not actually going to reduce the gambling ads that you are putting out there, if you are not going to minimise harm by ensuring that kids understand what gambling looks like—and the kids actually want to participate; the kids want to grab an app. And when you are creating gambling ads where you have got a bunch of blokes walking into a pub and they are all on their phones betting—that is their social interaction—that is not healthy behaviour. Why are you as an industry supporting that? Why are you as an industry promoting that? Just stop it. Cut it out.

Mr McGuire interjected.

Ms WARD: I know it is about money, member for Broadmeadows—it is absolutely about that. Where is the social responsibility here, though? Where is the investment in community? Absolutely, the gambling industry can give money to sporting clubs and the rest of it. But you are doing that because we make you do it. You do not do it out of the goodness of your heart. There needs to be a social contract here where there is some responsibility taken for the gambling ads that we are being subjected to and who they are being targeted at. They are absolutely being targeted at kids and they are absolutely being targeted at teenagers, just as they are being targeted at adults, and that is shameful behaviour. It is exactly the same as the tobacco industry. The tobacco industry worked very hard to get kids in at a young age, to hide the harm but to get kids in.

Mr McGuire interjected.

Ms WARD: Absolutely, member for Broadmeadows, get them hooked so that all throughout their lives they are participating in gambling. They need to cut it out—they absolutely need to cut it out. It is ridiculous. It is on every sports show you watch, and I have said this before in this place. I love watching The Front Bar. It is a great show. It is terrific, it is fun, it is funny. There is great analysis of football, and it is enjoyable to watch. All throughout it are bloody gambling ads. It is relentless. And then you have got ‘Mick’s multi’ halfway through. There is normalisation of football commentators around gambling and around gambling odds. So it is not just that you can put the TV on mute during the ad breaks to try and block out the ads, you have got commentators talking about it throughout the game. It is relentless.

We are embarking on an economic journey that we know is going to be painful. We know the cost of living is going up, we know that energy prices are going up, we know that grocery prices are going up and we know petrol prices are going up. People are doing it hard, and the last thing they need is the gambling industry selling them false hope and sucking up money that they cannot afford to spend. As I have said before: just cut it out. Give people some space. How much money does the gambling industry actually have to raise? How much revenue? How much profit do they need to make? Just slow down. Make your profit, make your money. There do not have to be record profits every year from the misery of other people. Your profits come from people losing money. And why would you continue to hammer people to try and suck money away from them?

I am not saying that there should never be gambling ads on TV. What I am saying is: reduce it. Make sure that your ads are not on of an evening when kids are watching games, when kids are watching sport. Put them on later at night. Have some social conscience about this, and stop trying to suck money out of people who can ill afford it. We are entering a period when we need corporations to show an absolute social conscience, and the gambling industry has to be a part of that.

Mr ROWSWELL (Sandringham) (11:07): I rise ahead of my colleague the member for Caulfield, who is at the table for the next 55 minutes and I am sure will make a mighty contribution to the debate on this bill within the next—

Mr Fowles: Mighty? Don’t stuff it up.

Mr ROWSWELL: Yes, member for Burwood, an absolutely mighty contribution—I expect nothing less from my good friend and colleague the member for Caulfield, and within the next 55 minutes I am sure he will do such.

I rise to address the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022, and in doing so acknowledge the great work in this policy space of my colleague the member for Euroa, who very capably led this debate on behalf of the Liberal and National coalition just moments ago. I am a little concerned with what I have heard from the government members’ contributions during the course of this debate so far. The first comment made by the member for Euroa in making her substantive and substantial contribution to this debate, which spanned 30-odd minutes, was to indicate that the coalition would not be opposing this bill. We are not here for war, we are here to simply put our case on this bill. But I am concerned that the members of the government have almost—well, not almost, they have—given the impression that there are significant issues in the gambling and liquor regulation space. My concern with that is that for the majority of the last two decades it has been Labor that have been entrusted by the Victorian people to govern this state. If there are as significant issues within this space as have been indicated by members of the government during the course of this debate, why haven’t they spent the majority of the last two decades trying to fix those issues, trying to establish or propose further reforms in this space? I suspect the reality is that there are not that many issues in this space. If the bottom line from some members of the government is that this area of policy in the liquor and the gambling space is just so harmful for people, well, why not be frank and say, ‘Let’s ban it’? I mean, if it is really that much of an issue, why not go to that extreme? That is the impression that you would get from hearing some members of the government during the course of this debate.

My experience in this space is probably pretty similar to many people’s experience in this space. I am a 36-year-old bloke, I like catching up with others, I like going to the pub and I like having a punt—not too much and not to excess. And I must say that my interactions in this space at a personal level have been entirely appropriate and certainly not to excess, and that has been the experience of those who I call friends as well. It is also clear to me in my interactions with some people who operate in this space, professional people who operate in this space, that they are not inclined to wait for the government—no matter what the colour of the government is—to set new regulations in this space, to set new laws in this space. They are fully aware; they are fully apprised of their social obligation. They are in fact proposing and working through things that make gambling to excess less harmful without the need for government regulation, without the need for government interference.

There are legitimate businesses within this state who are going about giving options to those people who engage in this space, giving those people options to curtail behaviour, to put checks on themselves and to encourage self-responsibility—because my very strong view is that that is what we should be encouraging people to do. We should not be coming to this place to create new laws to curtail behaviour necessarily; we should be encouraging people to do the right thing by them and to educate them about that beforehand—and frankly, the liquor and gambling industry are not waiting for governments to stipulate what those areas might be.

It is also important during the course of this debate to recognise the contribution that clubs and pubs right around this state make, and that is not just through the employment of Victorians. I think of the Australian Hotels Association, for example, which employs more than 50 000 Victorians. As I have said in this place before, it is not just a job. A job is an opportunity to be self-sufficient, to be self-reliant, to provide for yourself, to provide for your family, to pay your power bills, to pay your mortgage, to send your kids to school, to treat yourself and to save for a family holiday, and it is so much more than that. In the case of the Australian Hotels Association, where they have got about 50 000 employees connected to their associated pubs and clubs, they give that opportunity to some 50 000 Victorians.

I can think of pubs and clubs around this state who recognise their social contract with their local community and give back to their community, who give back to their local sporting clubs, who dip into their own pockets and who do not rely upon government funding, whether it be local government funding or state government funding, to pay for club jumpers or new training equipment or whatever it might be for particular sporting clubs—no, no, no. Those local sporting clubs, those local community organisations, know that their local pubs and clubs have their back. They can go to them and they can ask them to contribute to their local sporting organisation in that way, and they do. And that is a wonderful thing. That is what our community should be about—that local ecosystem that supports each other. This is a social contract that I am referring to.

This bill makes arrangements for the gambling and casino regulator, the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission, and implements the government’s decisions to separate gambling and liquor regulation by establishing a new regulator for liquor, the Victorian Liquor Commission, otherwise referred to as the VLC. The amendments in this bill will transfer all aspects of liquor regulation, which is currently undertaken by the VGCCC, to the new VLC. On face value it would appear that there is a bit of a shuffling of the deckchairs here. I am not aware that there are substantive changes to the way that liquor is regulated in this state as part of this change. Yes, there is a new body, but broadly speaking, at a principles level, will there be substantive changes to the way that liquor is regulated in this state? I am not aware that that is part of the government’s plan here. I understand that this is in response to a recommendation of the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence, which was held very recently.

In closing, I just want to conclude where I began. It does concern me that the government contributors to this debate have sought to draw out many, many issues that they perceive with the gambling and the liquor industries here in Victoria. These industries are legal industries. They employ people, they recognise their social contract and they give back to our community in substantial ways. That also deserves recognition, and I am happy to pay tribute to those industries for the work they do in that regard. It must also be noted that the same government members who have cast those wideranging and broad aspersions upon this legal industry are the same government members and members of a government that rely heavily upon the taxation income that those industries deliver to the state government, which then enables them to make broader contributions to our state in any number of areas. I think in discussing these matters a broader, more level-headed context is certainly required.

Mr FOWLES (Burwood) (11:17): The member for Sandringham in his contribution today has leapt to the defence of the gambling industry in a way that I think is somewhat disingenuous, because he has sought to draw out this perception that, one, the government is wholly and solely reliant on gambling income and therefore we are all in some kind of conflict of interest in relation to the regulation of that industry, but also that when we seek to highlight problems that the gambling industry has caused, either in our respective communities or elsewhere, we have omnipotent power to do something about that and any inaction is therefore solely at our feet. Of course many, many gambling entities in Australia are registered in different states. Many of them transmit their advertising via the airwaves that are regulated by the federal government. Many of them are offshore. There is a whole range of activities that do not necessarily fall within the jurisdictional purview of the Victorian Parliament, so it is not actually that easy always for us to act on a particular problem.

I recall that the member for Mount Waverley recently raised the issue of the purchase of credits within a particular children’s console game played on either an Xbox or a Nintendo Switch or whatever—for the benefit of the minister at the table, the Minister for Planning, it is sort of like a Commodore 64 but a bit faster—and that there is the ability to have gambling-like behaviour made available to children in that environment. There was not a strict jurisdictional head for Victoria to necessarily step in and regulate that conduct, but there is always the need for us as parliamentarians, as community representatives, to be live to what is happening in our communities and make sure we are bringing those issues forward. There is no doubt there has been an unbelievable proliferation of gambling advertising in recent years as smartphone-based and smart device-based gambling apps have made the accessibility of gambling so much easier. Once upon a time you had to go down to the TAB to get a bet on the races. Now you can do that sitting in this room. I am sure people have.

It is absolutely imperative that we continue to understand that technological change will drive change to the way that gambling is delivered to Victorians, and it may well be delivered by entities that are not Victorian or are not even Australian. They will be delivered by methods that have not been contemplated by regulators. It is, I think, disingenuous to try and suggest that all problem gambling sits at the feet of this government. We know that gambling can be problematic for some. I absolutely honour and respect the hard work done by many people in many of these businesses in a fair and legitimate way, but we just need to be live to the fact that there are not necessarily cure-alls or panaceas for some of the problems that are out there.

The Crown Casino frankly was a very good example of that, because there you had a complex that had at its heart a casino, yes, but a whole range of other activities, a whole range of other businesses and hundreds and hundreds—in fact thousands, nearly tens of thousands—of workers employed in non-gambling activity. Even just the hotel and functions business alone—a very, very large business—has no direct connection to the gambling business other than tangentially. Heaps of members of my union, the United Workers Union, and other unions and lots of workers are potentially going to be very, very badly affected—having come out of the pandemic, mind you—if a blunt instrument is applied to Crown Casino. There is no doubt that Crown Casino fell well short of its obligations and even further short of the expectations. Crown Resorts as the single biggest gambling operator in Australia in this market have an absolute obligation to be the best operator. They are the best resourced. They are the best placed to be delivering gambling services in the safest and most socially responsible way. They fell miles and miles and miles short of that goal; there is no doubt about that.

We want Crown to be a model citizen, and part of the behaviour change that is going through that organisation at the moment is being driven by the things we have set up, including the special manager. Part of it will be driven by public pressure, part of it will be driven by the regulatory changes contained in this bill and part of it, hopefully, will be delivered by a better quality of leadership than they have had historically. Plenty of people, including former Liberal ministers, have taken the golden parachute out of the joint, having run it into the ground. I can only hope that with better governance, with a better selection of directors and with a more ethical approach to their activities we will see better behaviour from Crown Casino, and this bill forms part of the picture, part of the response from the Victorian government to the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence to make sure that that in fact happens. My preliminary remarks, as they often do, have taken me all the way through to the 6-minute mark, so I will whizz along from here.

The approach to these reforms recognises that there is that separate role of the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission at the casino, and the role of the VGCCC is around casino activities and gambling activities. We need to accept and respect that there are other agencies that have a role at Crown, including, for example, Victoria Police. It is not the role of the VGCCC to be monitoring, for example, the sale of drugs at Crown Casino. They will report it if they see it, but it is not their key role to be down there engaged in that activity, and VicPol, frankly, are far better resourced and set up to be responding to individual instances of illegal conduct like that. The role of the VGCCC is about ensuring that the right controls are in place at the casino to limit the opportunities for some of the behaviours that we have seen come to light, including money laundering, which is obviously hugely concerning—money laundering that has been perhaps aided and abetted but most certainly ignored by parts of the Chinese government. It is important that we recognise that that regulatory role and that relatively narrowcast scope is adequately resourced—it will be, and it is—but that the depth of the powers that the VGCCC have are appropriate and are fit for purpose. That is why I am pleased that there are a number of changes being brought through in this bill that will improve the powers of the regulator.

One of those, and it is an important one, is actually enshrining into law that the VGCCC has as part of its core business minimising gambling-related harm. It is sort of extraordinary that that was not in there at the outset, but it is entirely appropriate for a dedicated gambling regulator that that sit at the absolute heart of their role. We do want to minimise gambling-related harm. There is a role for gambling, there is a place for gambling. I occasionally gamble. I do not have any issue with it. These are legal businesses conducting legal activity, but we have got to ensure that the harm minimisation arrangements are felt right through the organisation and that they are not seen as some sort of attack or some sort of greenwashing exercise done at the end.

One of the other reforms is to expand the education function of the regulator to making sure that people understand what their role is as well as delivering those harm minimisation activities. An additional reform is making sure that inspectors are given further and better access to the casino, including unfettered access to all security and surveillance equipment as well as books and records, irrespective of their location. It is absolutely the case that there has been unethical and illegal behaviour. The sanctions for those have been very, very significant. Crown’s shareholders—I am not one—have had a wild ride over the course of this journey because of the financial implications of the mistakes that they have made, and that is entirely appropriate; this is a mess of their own making. But it is really important that the regulator has the ability to cut past any unethical or illegal activity and access the material they need to be able to substantiate regulatory responses. And those responses include things like written undertakings. This bill allows the regulator to accept a written undertaking, and in addition to that, if the casino then breaches that undertaking, the regulator can actually seek court enforcement of it so that if they were then to further breach the undertaking they would be held in contempt, the consequences of which are very, very significant indeed.

I think we have seen we are in an era where there has been some normalisation of sports betting and odds betting and that kids have an awareness of this that they did not. That is a function of the advertising environment, and I support the work of the member for Eltham in trying to make sure that we do apply a lens to some of those trends that we are seeing in society more broadly. I thank the Minister for Consumer Affairs, Gaming and Liquor Regulation for bringing this bill to the house and wish it a speedy passage.

Mr MORRIS (Mornington) (11:27): I am pleased to have the opportunity to join this debate on the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. Of course, as page 1 tells us, we are amending the Casino Control Act 1991, the Gambling Regulation Act 2003, the Liquor Control Reform Act 1998 and the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission Act 2011. I should also, before I go on, declare an interest as a director of the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation, appointed by the Parliament. But I did want to make the point, in terms of a disclaimer at least, that my comments today do not in any way reflect necessarily the views of the board of the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation. They are entirely my own comments.

Mr Wynne: You’re not conflicted, though.

Mr MORRIS: I agree. The minister says I am not conflicted. I am not conflicted, but I think it is important to make the declaration just to put those comments in context. I do welcome the reforms proposed, and you have only got to go back to the comments of the casino royal commissioner, where he said in his opening remarks:

Within a very short time, the Commission discovered that for many years Crown Melbourne had engaged in conduct that is, in a word, disgraceful. This is a convenient shorthand for describing conduct that was variously illegal, dishonest, unethical and exploitative.

He went on to talk about the regulator being bullied and how the manner in which Crown responded to various investigations was behaviour that was not expected of a regulated entity, including providing false and misleading information, delaying the investigation and so on. He also went on to talk about the impact on vulnerable people who have a gambling problem and made the point quite rightly that the cost to the community of problem gambling is enormous. And it is not just the person with the problem that suffers of course, it is those around them and those beyond them.

There is also then some commentary around the unsuitability or otherwise of Crown to hold a licence. The point is that this was a complete failure in terms of the regulator—a complete and absolute failure. I know the member for Euroa talked about the resourcing of the regulator, and I think that that is a significant part of the issue. But the regulation failed.

While I do welcome the reforms that are proposed here, as I said, hopefully this is not an exercise of rearranging the deckchairs, because this new commission has to be properly resourced. The regulation of liquor and of gambling has been an ongoing problem for decades, but when you come to the second-reading speech, the bulk of the speech is about, effectively, the casino, whereas when you look at the bill, the bulk of the bill is in fact about regulating liquor—perhaps rewriting, not reinventing the legislation around the administration of the liquor system but simply remaking that legislation with a different agency overseeing it. So I am not convinced that we have got this right. I am not convinced that we have got the administration or regulation of liquor right, and I am not convinced that we have got the regulation of gambling right. When you look at the participation rate, it is critical that we do get that right because at least 70 per cent of Victorians, or 69 per cent of Victorians, engage in one gambling activity each year. Forty-four per cent engage in TattsLotto and 37 per cent in buying raffle tickets and things, but playing pokies or electronic gaming machines (EGMs), 14.1 per cent, and in the casino, 6.1 per cent. Those are significant numbers of Victorians, and it is important that we get it right.

As others have commented, I am certainly not a wowser. Yes, I do gamble. Mostly it is TattsLotto, but if I go to the races, I will put 10 bucks on a horse. That is about the extent of it; frankly it does not excite me in the slightest. But I know for others it can be very addictive. But the reality is that prohibition does not work. People choose to gamble. They should be able to choose to gamble, and I certainly do not have a problem with that. But I also recognise that these are very big businesses. Quite rightly, in the time that we have had the casino operating and in the run-up to its opening, we have had a focus on organised crime, and that is entirely reasonable, particularly given the huge amounts of cash that wash through the system. But I think we also need to have a focus on the impact on consumers, because it is frankly not acceptable to have an industry of this nature that is not heavily regulated and that is not effectively regulated, because when you think about it, a licence to have electronic gaming machines is effectively a licence to make money. It is a lucrative licence. I know some have found it difficult to make a dollar, but the overwhelming majority do very well. Similarly, with a casino, it is lucrative, but it is also a monopoly, so it has got to be heavily regulated and it has got to be effectively regulated.

I also think there is an argument to be had around how the proceeds of the activities from this industry are utilised. Frankly, if the outcomes from what is potentially a harmful activity are simply to generate profits for the providers, to generate significant revenue streams for the state, to generate jobs, either directly or indirectly—and all of those are good things—if those are the only outcomes, that is simply not good enough, because as I mentioned, I think the community has the right to participate but it has the right to participate on a level playing field.

This is a potentially harmful activity, so you have got to have support mechanisms in place to allow the activity to take place but to recognise that there are potentially harmful outcomes. You need the regulation. You need to provide the support. We have an activity called ‘driving on the road’. We have the regulation: you cannot drive wherever you like, you have got to drive on the left-hand side. If the worst outcome happens and you have a collision, you have support services there—you have ambulances to come and get people who are injured, you have tow trucks to come and take away the cars. You have all those things, and then you have the ongoing support—and all of those things just happen as a matter of course. But we do not necessarily see that in terms of this industry.

To give you an example, if you look at the total media spend of the casino—the EGM providers, the operators, the various other opportunities for wagering and betting, the total money spent in those areas—and then compare it with the money spent for problem gambling service providers, for public education programs and for the impact of gambling, there just is no comparison. It is not a level playing field. It is way lopsided. If you think about how effective—going back to the road analogy—the TAC program has been, there has been a lot of money spent, but it has been an excellent investment. Together with effective regulation and tools like speed cameras, as a society we have driven down the road toll, even as the number of cars on the road has been expanding significantly. I think we really do need a similar campaign in terms of the gambling industry, but we need a well-resourced campaign. I am quite certain that the resources that are available at the moment—and maybe more resources will be available as a result of this bill going through—need to be boosted significantly.

I just want to conclude by referring very quickly to the impact of the pandemic. Life shifted online for many people throughout the pandemic, and life gambling-wise shifted online for many people as well. That is an epidemic we still have to come. Again, we need much better support for those services.

Ms HALL (Footscray) (11:37): I am pleased to rise to make a contribution in support of this bill and make sure that the Victorian government keeps upholding the highest possible standard of gambling regulation. I would like to make a couple of comments, I suppose, on contributions from a number of people in this place. Firstly, the member for Clarinda made a really thoughtful contribution with respect to gambling harm in his community. That is something I would also like to reflect on, because in my electorate of Footscray in Melbourne’s inner west we have long dealt with a disproportionate amount of gambling-related harm, in the City of Maribyrnong and in the City of Brimbank.

In preparing for this contribution I looked at some old research—it is from 2014, but it is the most recent I could find from the City of Maribyrnong—where they talked about the gambling losses in different parts of my community. The part of my community that I wanted to speak about today is Braybrook. Braybrook is a part of Melbourne’s inner west that has historically experienced high levels of disadvantage. There is a very large amount of public housing in Braybrook. Braybrook is a place that has a number of places with electronic gaming machines, and the damage they do in my community is far reaching and has a number of flow-on effects. I read some research from the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation, where a local resident spoke about the impact it has on Vietnamese women in my community. A number of those women find themselves in situations where if their partner or family member is addicted to gambling, it forces them into situations of homelessness, family violence or even begging. It has terrible impacts. In Braybrook the pokies losses in 2014–15—and at that time Braybrook was the fourth-most disadvantaged suburb in Victoria—were $15 million, from a number of hotels with machines.

One of the things I often reflect on when I am driving through Footscray is the fact that one of our main gaming venues is opposite a primary school. It is called The Palms. It is directly opposite Footscray North Primary School. It never fails to disappoint me, and I wonder what impact that has had on the community. That is the same street that my grandparents lived on, and I know that when my grandfather died it became a place that my grandmother, because I think often she was lonely, would go to—down to The Palms. I wonder how much social disconnection and disadvantage and lack of social inclusion leads to those impacts—leads to people going to places where they spend money that perhaps they do not have because they are lonely. Of course the levels of addiction in Melbourne’s western suburbs are something that I have always been concerned about.

The member for Eltham spoke really powerfully about the impact of gambling advertising, so Sportsbet or the different betting agencies. I was thinking about that. Just recently the Western Region Football League—in my community and in yours, Acting Speaker Connolly—held a round called Love the Game, Not the Odds, and the reason they did that is that the impact of gambling advertising on young men in particular has just gone into every element of their lives. We know that 18- to 24-year-old men account for a third of all the sports betting. That is shocking, and it is because they have grown up in a culture where they are so used to seeing gambling ads. I remember going to the football recently and listening to a conversation of some young men sitting next to me, and all they were talking about was the odds. When I say they were young, they might have been between 10 and 15 years old. I think that is a pretty sad state of affairs, where gambling advertising in this country has affected our culture so much that our local footy clubs are organising rounds of football to encourage kids to focus on the game and not on the odds. I thought the member for Eltham’s contribution was really powerful and also her reflection that there were parallels between the tobacco industry and the gambling industry. But I was really pleased to hear about her petition, and I might do something similar in my community of Footscray. The Western Bulldogs locally have been out of gaming since 2019, and that is something I am really proud of. They had a venue in the heart of Footscray which had been a source of a lot of problems, and I was very pleased to see the Western Bulldogs, with their commitment to our local community, get rid of their gaming machines. So there have been positive steps but there is so much more that can be done, particularly within those communities I was speaking about, and Braybrook is one that comes to mind.

This bill amends three key pieces of legislation—with my preamble, as with the member for Burwood, I have got 2½ minutes to go—the Casino Control Act 1991, the Gambling Regulation Act 2003 and the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission Act 2011. By amending these acts the Victorian government will be able to provide stronger, more focused oversight of Victoria’s casino licence operator and gambling sector and liquor regulation. Liquor and gaming regulation will be separated, establishing a new regulator that will operate with the support of the Department of Justice and Community Safety.

I just want to also respond to some of the comments from members of the opposition. The recent budget included a huge commitment to boost gambling regulation—$55.6 million, which includes funding for the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission. This also includes funding for the office of the special manager overseeing every single aspect of Crown’s operations with extraordinary powers. We are also ensuring that the regulator has the resources it needs to do its job now and into the future.

We want Crown Casino to be a model citizen, and this reform, this work, lays the foundations to make sure that it is properly regulated. The bill fully establishes the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission, which will be able to provide a dedicated focus on monitoring gambling and the casino. It will be able to take disciplinary action against the casino following even a single breach of the responsible gambling code of conduct, and it will be able to require and accept an enforceable undertaking from the casino operator. Casino inspectors will be given greater access to surveillance equipment, books, records and documents, with casino employees required to assist inspectors to access surveillance equipment. This is a really important step. All of us were appalled at what we saw happening at Crown Casino. There is a lot of work we have to do in this country to tackle the impact of gambling-related harm. A lot of that comes from the gambling companies themselves. I wish this bill a speedy passage.

Mr SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (11:48): There is an old saying: where there are two flies crawling up a wall they will soon attract onlookers betting on which fly will reach the top first. Betting is certainly something that has been part of the fabric of our culture and our community, and we see it right throughout our community in so many different ways. I want to particularly pay tribute to a number of members in the chamber because it is not so much about the passion or the interest in what betting attracts, but it is how far that betting goes and what that does in terms of when it starts to impinge on not just somebody’s values but more importantly their welfare and day-to-day life. That is really the crux of a lot of things where regulation and education become just so important.

We are seeing betting evolve from the traditional casinos, horseracing and the TAB, as the Minister for Planning says, at the table, to cards, footy, sports—we see it in just about everything now. There is gaming and arcade games. Even when I was involved in an organisation called Try Youth and Community Services we used to have these things called lucky envelopes, which would be sold at pubs. You would put in a dollar or two and get the lucky envelope and hopefully get a prize. There were also things like bingo centres, and again that was something that Try Youth did. As a service that helped vulnerable kids it used to do these things that provided, in many ways, entertainment—particularly bingo—for a lot of lonely people. A lot of people would turn up each week, meet people and try their luck. So all that is the fabric of our community, and I do not think for one minute we should be trying to shut down any of that kind of stuff. The idea of people having a go and potentially trying their luck I think is wonderful.

But I do have concerns when things are not done right and appropriately, and we have seen that particularly with the way Crown Casino have conducted themselves. We have seen that in terms of the lack of regulation and the issues with the regulator. As much as we can sing Kumbaya in this chamber, the issues with Crown Casino happened under the government’s watch and under the regulator with their lack of being able to apply proper regulation in managing the casino, which allowed corruption, which allowed money laundering and which allowed the likes of organised crime, drugs and a whole range of things to enter into a world which nobody wants to see here in this state. We have to do everything we possibly can to stamp that stuff out because that then bleeds into our communities and into the fabric of our great society—and many people have made contributions already in this chamber about that.

When we saw under the Bergin report the issues that were happening in our casinos and the very issues that were happening at Crown, the government’s response—certainly to say it in the most polite way possible—was lacklustre. It could have been a lot quicker in stamping on this. We should have got onto it a lot quicker. We have now got these recommendations from the commission which we support; there are some 33 recommendations from the royal commission which we support. There are 22 outstanding recommendations that are yet to be legislated, and the bill seeks to address particularly recommendations 17 and 18, which are the powers of the inspectors. This stuff is really important because it separates off the regulator when it comes to liquor regulation and that for gambling. And then the regulators and the inspectors are able to go in, and their function is to ascertain whether money laundering or loansharking is taking place or whether illicit drugs are being sold, to make an exclusion order where appropriate, to withdraw a person’s licence and to ensure that things are functioning appropriately.

When the New South Wales Bergin inquiry was put together, it found that Crown Melbourne facilitated millions of dollars to be laundered through the bank account of its subsidiary, and Crown allowed operators with links to organised crime to arrange for junket players to gamble at the casino. We saw the imagery on the likes of 60 Minutes and the Age, which did some really good reporting of what was going on—and as I say, no-one wants to see that. It is not a fair, level playing field. It is not an appropriate playing field, and it is not something that anyone would be supporting. And in fact we need to do everything possible to stamp that out, hold people to account that have done the wrong thing and ensure that these businesses operate appropriately.

The member for Sandringham made some good points about many businesses very much wanting to do the appropriate and the right thing and the importance of doing that in terms of protecting their reputation. I will not talk about the specifics of the betting operator that I was talking with a few weeks back, but I was sitting next to somebody whose job is all around the integrity of gambling. What she does is she goes through all of the betting lists, and when somebody makes a bet that is out of the ordinary—so somebody puts $10 000 on a horse—she will then go and have a look at that, investigate that. And if it seems that that person has put on that money which is well and truly above their means and it puts them in a very difficult situation in which financially it will cause problems for their family, they will actually refund the bet. Even though it is lost, they will pay that debt back. I did not realise that that kind of thing would even happen. She was telling me that just for their own sake, for their own business, for their own reputation they cannot afford for that kind of stuff to happen. When people make a legitimate bet where they can—obviously there is a limit to this, and there is counselling and there are other things that you need to do to ensure you are educating those people—it is one thing, when someone bets when they have got the money to do it, but when somebody is literally betting their house and putting their family and everything on the line, the consequences of that are huge, so to be able to have that kind of integrity element really does comfort me.

I am not saying that we should have everything self-regulated, but there is an element of that that I think we should absolutely take into account—that many businesses do do that, because at the end of the day if they do not have integrity in their business, they end up going broke anyway. We see that in farming, we see that in fishing and we see that in a lot of businesses—that you have to look at investing for future generations, particularly if that is something that you are relying on getting your income from. I was one of the inaugural representatives on the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation that was put together under the member for Malvern when he was the minister. That was a fantastic initiative, and I know that has continued. It did have a bit of a rocky road in this current term of government. I understand that it is now back on track, so to speak. And it did take a long while for reappointments of people from here—I think it was six months to get the member for Mornington from our side appointed onto that board. I am glad that he was appointed to that board because I think it is a very, very important board. A big part of what the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation does is educate people and provide awareness, and we absolutely do need to do that.

I come from a betting family. My uncle made a small fortune out of a big fortune from gambling. A lot of the money that he made was gambled away. Thankfully he did not have kids and he did not have family, so the only person he was really hurting was himself. But I know that on many occasions my father had to help him and bail him out in very, very difficult sets of circumstances. It is traumatic when somebody is a problem gambler, and we do need to do whatever we can to help problem gamblers. That is one of the reasons that prompted me to get involved in the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation. I love to have an occasional bet—a very occasional bet. Even my children, now at the ages of 18 and 21, love following basketball and everything and will have a dollar or $2 on something, but they are educated to understand what is a bit of fun and what is something that becomes a problem. I think that is what we need to do in our community—educate people to understand the consequences. In the end we cannot control people to the nth degree. We have got to give people the opportunity to make their own decisions—informed decisions—and ultimately to be informed that there are consequences when you make the wrong ones.

Mr MAAS (Narre Warren South) (11:58): I too rise to make a contribution to the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022, and I do so after my colleagues have made some very strong contributions as well. The bill is the next stage of this Labor government’s overhaul of gambling regulation, and that follows the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence. At the end of last year the government established the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission (VGCCC) as a standalone gambling regulator to focus on holding the industry to the highest standards that it possibly can. The minister at the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee hearing just a few weeks ago, in my view, did not struggle and in fact was very strong in detailing the $55.6 million that is in the 2022–23 budget and how these moneys will be used to respond to the recommendations that the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence has given and to enhance and improve gambling and liquor regulation.

The bill will finalise the governance and structure of the VGCCC and respond to further recommendations of the royal commission, with enhanced powers and functions including giving casino inspectors greater access to surveillance equipment and casino records and requiring casino employees to assist inspectors to access and operate surveillance equipment to monitor all activity on the gaming floor. This bill will also protect Victorians from gambling-related harm by embedding this as part of the VGCCC’s core functions, mandating that this shapes every decision that it makes.

When it comes to gambling-related harm, I would like to at this point acknowledge the Alliance for Gambling Reform. The alliance do incredible work. They are an organisation that is supported by some 60 different organisations throughout the country with the sole purpose of tackling the inequality and hardship that gambling causes. They work very hard to prevent and minimise harm from gambling, and their aim as well is to remove the shame that surrounds gambling addiction and to make people aware that it is actually a public health issue and that as such it should be treated that way. They are trying to achieve the legislative changes needed to protect our most vulnerable communities, and all strength to their arm, because they really do fantastic work in the community and are very powerful advocates in this space.

In terms of the response to the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence, the commission handed down its final report in October last year, and the government has responded pretty quickly in that the commission’s nine priority recommendations were implemented through the Casino and Gambling Legislation Amendment Act 2021, which we passed in December last year. This has now set up the necessary framework to start holding Crown to account, including establishing the role of the special manager.

The legislation also dismantled the deal that was put in place by the previous Liberal government which meant that Crown would be entitled to compensation for any changes that were made to the rules governing its operation. If you think about that, it is absolutely extraordinary that any changes to a public corporation’s means to operate could not be made unless there was compensation that was paid to that entity. I guess when you also think of that casino and the then chair and the then board and the party that they had served previously in Parliament, or the party that they were large donors to, maybe the deal that was put in place was not so surprising. Actually in this chamber today we have had members who have stated how hard it would have been to provide requisite board oversight in a casino, which is just absolutely extraordinary. Suffice to say that the royal commission was highly critical of that deal, a deal which only served to shield Crown from accountability, and abolishing it has paved the way for this government’s reform program to restore integrity to Victoria’s casino. It also increased the maximum penalty Crown could face from $1 million to $100 million, above and beyond what the royal commission recommended, and empowered the regulator to act directly on the royal commission’s findings.

In terms of the VGCCC, the former regulator, the Victorian Commission for Gambling and Liquor Regulation, was established by the previous Liberal government, and its merged model of gaming and liquor regulation was not fit for purpose, so we are completely overhauling how we regulate gambling in this state with a dedicated new regulator, the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission. It will have oversight of all gambling and gambling activities within the state, from pokies through to the casino, with its core business also focused on protecting Victorians from gambling-related harm. It is that particular piece which I will move to now, because when it comes to harm minimisation this government is doing more to tackle problem gambling and the harm it creates than any other government has done before it.

The bill itself will enshrine harm minimisation as a guiding principle of how we regulate gambling and how we protect Victorians from associated harms by embedding this as a key objective. The VGCCC currently does not have legislated objectives which guide how it regulates gambling, but the bill will insert new objectives into the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission Act 2011 to legally oblige the regulator to have regard to minimising gambling harm. Specifically it will make minimising gambling-related harm part of the VGCCC’s core business by requiring the commission to consider this in each and every decision it makes. It will also expand the regulator’s education function to include educating the public and delivering activities which minimise gambling harm.

These reforms build on a very strong record of this government of tackling gambling-related harm, including increasing funding to the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation to $153 million over four years, the largest commitment to address problem gambling in Australia’s history. Labor also introduced Your Play, the nation’s first statewide precommitment scheme, and tightened restrictions on how much and where gamblers can access money in venues. I am very proud of these key reforms in terms of harm minimisation. It was in my inaugural speech in fact that I spoke to the intolerable harm that gambling is doing in our communities, from a perspective of being in the outer suburbs of Melbourne, because I could see that that harm is especially inflicted upon those who have insecurity in their work, with their cost of living and with their health as well. And let us face it, those three areas are all Labor issues, and it is only this Labor government that can be trusted to ensure that we have the most comprehensive harm minimisation measures while working with the responsible venues and the people that they employ.

In conclusion, this government is getting on with the job and ensuring our regulatory framework upholds high standards in Victoria’s casino and gambling industries, and it will provide the focused new regulator with enhanced powers to hold the casino to account and a dedicated focus on protecting all Victorians from gambling-related harm. It is a good bill, and I commend it to the house.

Mr KENNEDY (Hawthorn) (12:08): I rise to make a contribution on the important Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. This bill is the latest iteration in the Andrews Labor government’s efforts to overhaul gambling regulation in this state, following the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence. We have heard a number of speakers today on this, and I would just like to, in a way, echo the member for Eltham and others in terms of outlining what is needed beyond regulation. I think that the media has a lot to answer for. I am still obsessed by those ridiculous ads where everything that you can think of in life is summed up in having a good gamble and then at the end of the advertisement it says, ‘Gamble responsibly’. Now, that is just absolute nonsense. It is very subtly put together, and then at the very end that sort of fervorino, in a word, ‘Oh, well, gamble responsibly’. So I would like to encourage the likes of Gruen on the ABC and others to take on gambling advertising and show it up for what it is, which is an absolute disgrace in a civilised community like ours.

What I am going to do today is talk about how we are fixing the mess the last Liberal government left us, a focus on harm minimisation—the Andrews government has a longstanding focus on harm minimisation—the new penalties and the new inspector powers, time permitting. Before we discuss the necessary changes this act will realise, we have to reflect on how the gambling regulatory protections had sunk to such a nadir that they required a royal commission. In the final report of the royal commission the activities of Crown were described as ‘disgraceful’, ‘illegal’, ‘dishonest’, ‘unethical’ and ‘exploitative’. It does not get much worse, I guess. Those opposite should hang their heads in shame. Changes they made under the previous Liberal government weakened the incentives for operators like Crown to act in the community’s best interests and weakened regulations and regulators. The previous Liberal government effectively established arrangements that made Crown untouchable. This meant that Crown would be entitled to compensation for any changes to the rules governing its operation. How convenient. The royal commission was highly critical of this deal, which only served to shield Crown from responsibility. The reforms in this bill will abolish these arrangements and pave the way for our reform program to restore integrity to Victoria’s casino. The previous Liberal government also changed arrangements so that the regulator had to assume regulatory responsibility for both gambling and liquor functions and duties. This clearly failed and overburdened the regulator. The bill will fix this error by separating the regulatory responsibilities of these two activities once again. This will allow the new Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission to focus solely on gambling activities.

I do not like to be playing political games, but it is important to set that context there. I notice that the member for Euroa is here today and was on about the Premier being too close to Crown. I think they are the sorts of harmful distractions that can get in the way of doing something really worthwhile here, and that is why we have to focus on the past, focus on the history of the Liberal government and learn from the past. The focus on harm minimisation then is important. I believe it is important to note that one of the most fundamental differences in this government’s approach, and indeed what will be enacted through this bill, is the need for gambling regulation to be focused on harm minimisation.

As referenced earlier, the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission, the VGCCC for short, will be established in this legislation. This revamped watchdog with new fangs will have its legislative functions and objectives amended to ensure greater clarity in its role. These changes will mean there is a clear focus to minimise harm from gambling and enhance the regulator’s ability to regulate gambling providers. This is crucial. We saw the final report of the royal commission describe Crown’s approach to dealing with vulnerable people who have a gambling problem as the most damning discovery during their investigation. Problem gambling not only inflicts suffering on gamblers but also often affects their family, friends and other institutions. The VGCCC act will therefore have a particular focus on harm minimisation. It will also expand the regulator’s existing education function to include public education about its regulatory practices and requirements as well as delivering activities which minimise gambling harm. With harm minimisation as a core principle at the heart of the new VGCCC, this bill ensures that the regulator will always be guided by the responsibility to protect Victorians from gambling-related harm.

The Andrews government has a longstanding focus on harm minimisation. It is doing more to tackle problem gambling and the harm it creates than any government has before, and this bill is testament to that. These reforms build on our strong record of tackling gambling-related harm, including increasing funding to the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation to $153 million over four years, the largest commitment to address problem gambling in Australian history. It is always tempting in this place, I have noticed, to pick out something and say, ‘Oh, yes, but they’ve reduced the number of inspectors’. We have got to really stop that game and we have got to actually focus on: what are the duties; what is the total organisation; what are the powers? That is the sort of stuff that is important rather than just picking a few numbers out and so on. That is in my humble opinion anyway.

Let us go to the new penalties. In the findings of the royal commission the penalties that could be imposed on a misbehaving gambling provider were clearly shown to be insufficient. This is why we as a government have lifted the maximum penalty Crown could face from $1 million to $100 million. This goes above and beyond what the royal commission recommended and has already empowered the regulator to act directly on the royal commission’s findings. Led by the inaugural chair and CEO, Fran Thorn and Annette Kimmitt, the VGCCC has wasted no time holding Crown to account. Since commencing on 1 January 2022 it has already taken disciplinary action against Crown, imposing an $80 million fine for the China UnionPay process uncovered by the royal commission. This is one of the largest fines imposed on a casino anywhere in the world. This fine was welcomed by the chief advocate of the Alliance for Gambling Reform, Reverend Tim Costello. He said:

Finally we have a watchdog with some teeth, the stronger legislative powers given to the VGCCC should be applauded. This fine is a vindication of strengthening its powers …

It means Victorians can at last receive some protection from the Crown-enabling organised crime activities that the casino has been shown to undertake with near impunity for years.

The state capture of the regulator over many years has meant Crown has effectively done what it likes with only the prospect of a pitiful $1m fine as punishment.

In addition to the fine the VGCCC has conducted a thorough investigation of unpaid casino tax and recovered $61 million from Crown, responding directly to findings of the royal commission.

The bill will enhance inspectors’ powers with increased access to surveillance equipment, books, records, documents and so on at the casino, something they were shamefully denied by Crown. That is the important thing rather than numbers of inspectors, with all due respect. The royal commission identified consistent failures on the part of the casino operator to use its surveillance equipment to detect money laundering and other crime. I commend the bill to the house.

Ms EDWARDS (Bendigo West) (12:18): I am pleased to make a contribution to the Casino and Liquor Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. I thank the member for Hawthorn for his very considered contribution and his highlighting of the harm minimisation that is so necessary when it comes to gambling. As many members of course would be aware, I have been a member of the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation (VRGF) for a number of years, and that is our sole purpose—our sole purpose is to minimise harm from gambling. I also noted that the member for Hawthorn mentioned the advertising that many of us have to endure when we watch sport in particular on our television screens. The reality is that it is a requirement for the gambling industry now to have that wording on the bottom of the screen, ‘Gamble responsibly’. We are in a position where gambling exists, and it is probably not going to go away ever, but it is about making sure that those who do gamble do so responsibly and have supports such as the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation and of course the new authority that this bill establishes to make sure that harm from gambling is absolutely minimised.

I just want to refer, if I could, to the member for Euroa’s contribution earlier this morning. I noticed that the member for Euroa never once mentioned in her contribution gambling harm or the important measures that this legislation brings to harm minimisation from gambling. It is one thing to take the high moral ground when it comes to Crown Casino and legislation that is before the Parliament today and has been in the past and will be again in the future, but the reality is that taking the high moral ground is not actually a solution to implementing all of the recommendations from the Royal Commission into the Casino Operator and Licence.

It is very well known in this house—other members have referred to it—and I think there is a general consensus that gambling is indeed a public health issue and that preventing gambling-related harms does require a very broad response. The fact is that we have limited data at the moment and limited evidence really on gambling-related harms, especially when we compare it to our knowledge around other public health threats, but it is starting to change, and the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation is very active in this space. Classifying gambling as an addictive behaviour and increasing recognition of harms are increasing fields of research, particularly in that public health sphere.

All of us know or have known someone who has been affected by gambling and the harms that come with it, but there is quite a diverse range of risks from gambling. That extends from housing and homelessness to domestic violence, debt, family breakdown, depression and of course ultimately in some circumstances, tragically, suicide. Certainly, as has been mentioned by others as well, there are certain groups that are more vulnerable to harmful gambling, particularly men and young people, certain ethnic minority groups, homeless people and people with mental health and substance misuse issues. But what is less evident is the impact beyond the individual gambler, and I think the communities across Victoria are becoming more aware of gambling harm in their own communities. I certainly know there are a number of organisations in Bendigo, such as the Bendigo Community Health Service, that are working progressively towards supporting particularly multicultural groups in understanding the harm that comes with gambling.

As I have mentioned in this house many, many times when I have spoken on these bills, gambling among young people, particularly young men, is a growing concern. We know that the risk-taking behaviours that we see, particularly in teenagers and particularly in young men in their 20s, can lead to problem gambling and the harm that comes with that. It is a unique public health issue in this space because the rapidly changing impact of technology on behaviour is impacting on these young people and it is blurring the lines between what we know is established gambling—I am talking about pokies and Crown, for example—and online gambling, which is a growing concern.

The newly established authority that this bill refers to, the Victorian Gambling and Casino control Commission (VGCCC), has as its focus—for the first time, I think, that any established authority has—a dedication to harm minimisation. That is a central tenet of this legislation. Yes, we have established this new authority, and yes, we have separated it out from the liquor commission, but the central premise of this legislation is that this new regulator will have a harm minimisation function, and that will inform every single part of its approach to regulating Crown Casino. I think that is a really important part of this legislation.

The design of the VGCCC is being informed by best practice regulatory arrangements from around the world. It will have a dedicated focus on holding the casino operator to account, particularly because it will have specialised staff and dedicated commissioners. The legislation that we passed in 2021 set the basis for further legislation, and this means that the VGCCC already has increased powers to hold Crown to account, including a duty for casino operators and their associates to comply with the VGCCC in a frank manner and do everything necessary to ensure the casino operations are conducted with integrity. And for the first time ever the VGCCC will also be able to accept enforceable undertakings to ensure that their decisions are implemented, and an additional mechanism is provided to ensure compliance. These are really important measures because it means Crown Casino will be held to account at every step of the way. The legislation also includes provisions which require the casino operator to notify the VGCCC of significant breaches of its regulatory obligations to the state as soon as practical. Casino operators providing false or misleading information to the VGCCC now have to face a penalty.

Of course legislation responding to the remaining royal commission recommendations is currently being prepared by the Victorian government for introduction later this year, and I think that is an important point, because I note that some contributors from the other side have referred to the fact that this is piecemeal and that it is not actually going anywhere. But it is incremental reform, and it takes time to prepare legislation about Crown Casino and that makes sure that the royal commission recommendations are implemented, and if that means taking our time to get it right, then that is exactly what we will do. It was this government that actually established the royal commission into Crown, and I think that it is probably only a Labor government that will get on and implement its recommendations. We did commit to implementing all of the recommendations, and I am pretty sure that is exactly what we will do. As I said, further legislation will be introduced later this year.

I am really pleased that those opposite are not opposing—as opposed to supporting—this legislation before the house today, but I do ask maybe if they could just think along the lines of actually having some bipartisan support, particularly in relation to gambling harm, not politicising institutions that have been established, like the VRGF, like the VGCCC, to ensure that the public of Victoria and the people of Victoria who are potentially at risk of gambling harm have the most protection possible. That is so important, because that is why we are here today—to make sure that everyone in Victoria can be reassured that the government is supporting them. Yes, gambling exists, but we want to make sure that anyone who gambles does so in a responsible manner and does not suffer from the risks that go with excessive gambling and the harm—the dreadful, dreadful harm—that can come from a gambling addiction. I commend the bill to the house.

Mr EDBROOKE (Frankston) (12:28): It is great to be in the house speaking on such an important bill and following my good friend who spoke very profoundly then. Thank you for such a well-rounded speech on that bill. I welcome bills like this that come through the house. It is again another proud day of bringing through progressive legislation that is well thought out. As the member for Bendigo West said, it does take time to do these kinds of things, and I will talk about that in a minute. But the most important part of this bill, I think, is the harm reduction.

Anyone in the house can pull me up, but I am yet to meet the man or woman that says they bought their house by going to the pokies and playing the one-armed bandits. I am yet to meet people that have successfully gambled to make a living. I must admit, I do not come from a gambling family, but on the flipside of what I have just said, I see a lot of gambling harm, especially in my community, and I see the investment from the government, from unions and from community groups to treat that harm. And that is not just harm to individuals who cannot control their gambling or have gambling addictions. It is the harm to their families; it is the harm that is caused to their relatives when they have not got a roof over their head and cannot make repayments and things like that. So anything that is brought to this house that can reinforce minimisation of harm due to gambling is something that is welcome for me especially.

I think my community would wholeheartedly support this bill. It has been a fairly well-publicised story, the revival of the Frankston Dolphins. As a club one large issue that the Frankston Dolphins had, and one of the reasons they went under and their VFL licence was taken from them, was the fact that they made some bad decisions around licensing pokies in their bar. It did not go well for them. It is just another story where I am yet to meet somebody who can proudly say, ‘I won on the pokies. I won big time, long term’. These are machines that are programmed to make money and take that off people. As I have said, anything that can reinforce that harm minimisation is terribly important. So we have got the story of the Frankston Dolphins.

Recently I flew to New South Wales and visited a place called Foundation House—a model we want to actually have here in Victoria, run by unions for workers’ residential addiction rehabilitation—and met some people who have dealt with gambling addiction or were undergoing treatment for it. I must say that was an eye-opener. Again, anything at all that can go through this house that recognises the legal ability for people to gamble and do what they want—they are free to do that—but minimises harm, whether it be through education or regulation, is very, very important to my community, because my community is one that has been affected by gambling addiction. As far as those harm minimisation reforms go, I think we are doing more than ever before to tackle problem gambling and the harm it creates—probably more than any other government in history, I would say.

In saying that, gambling has evolved. The member for Caulfield and several members on this side have spoken about how it used to be the dishlickers and the horses, but seriously—I know there are some people that will yell out—now you can basically gamble on anything, and it is freely available. I do not know, the member for Euroa could be on her phone now losing money on Angry Birds or something like that.

Ms Ryan: No, I’m not a gamer.

Mr EDBROOKE: There are games that children—

Ms Ryan interjected.

Mr EDBROOKE: I know the member for Mount Waverley has talked before in this house about the blurred line between adults gambling and children using apps in which they have to pay for tokens—that in essence is a form of gambling and is introducing children to it. We have got gambling televised on mobile devices. We have still got the TABs. But it is everywhere, and the advertising is everywhere. Because of that increase, because of that change and evolution in the market, I think it is very wise for the government to take on every single recommendation out of the inquiry and ensure that we act on them too.

The bill actually enshrines harm minimisation as a guiding principle of how we regulate gambling as well. That is to protect Victorians from the harms that I have been talking about, and that is a key objective of this bill. We want to lessen the chance of the grandmother going through the grandchild’s savings jar for a couple of cents so she can have a win. We want to make sure that people are secure and are not gambling away their house, and this helps do that. The Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission does not currently have legislated objectives on how it regulates gambling. This bill will put in place that guiding principle of harm minimisation by inserting new objectives into the act to legally oblige the regulator to have regard to minimising gambling harm as well, which is so important. Specifically it makes minimising gambling-related harm part of the core business by requiring the commissioner to consider this in each and every decision they make. There will be people in this house today that say that is common sense and who cannot believe that that was not done before, but I think it is a great step in the right direction. It will change a lot of decisions that the commissioner makes if they make those decisions with the dialogue and with the optic of how this affects gambling addiction and how this harms or does not harm someone.

Importantly, this bill also expands and regulates the education function to include educating the public and delivering activities which minimise gambling harm as well. These need to be a lot more than just a tiny sub line on an advert—‘Drink responsibly’, ‘Gamble responsibly’ or whatever. These are actually going to be education campaigns. I hope—and we will be following this up—that as part of these campaigns we are focusing them on youth and that they do not speak at the youth but actually take the market that they see and make sure that they are aware of the dangers of this as well.

We introduced YourPlay, the nation’s first statewide precommitment scheme, and that tightened restrictions on the amount of money you can access in venues. You see that across the board in pubs and whatnot. I do not think there is anyone that is going to complain about that—even gamblers. It is a good stop and check, it is a good reset and it is working. These reforms certainly build on the very strong record that this government has of tackling that addiction-related harm, especially with gambling, and I note that we have increased the funding to the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation by $153 million over four years, which is the largest commitment to addressing problem gambling in Australian history.

Again, it is bills like this, it is bills like what we were speaking on yesterday in regard to the Nazi swastika legislation, that make me very proud to be a member of a government that will act on issues, not just stand there, be silent and let these things pass us by. We are not afraid to get up, to have our say, to be challenged by the community, to make decisions that are for the good of the community and to make sure that everyone is consulted. I know people were widely consulted on this bill. I know that that happened, obviously, through the inquiry into Crown. But from my perspective, as I have said repeatedly, anything that can stop people on that roundabout, where we have to spend money as a government to clean up the mess created by gambling, is a good thing. If we can start at the source and deal with the actual issue, it is great, so we do not have to deal with it down the other end.

I still, as I have said, do not know anyone who would be against this bill. As you said in your speech, Deputy Speaker, it would be lovely to see some bipartisan support instead of not opposing—they are two different things. I think most people on the other side of the house would support this, but it would be nice to see someone stand up and say they actually support this legislation and tell us about some clauses, how it affects the community, why they support this and why they would like to see this enacted and passed. With that, I will give some time for some other speakers to get up on this very important bill, and I commend the bill to the house.

Ms NEVILLE (Bellarine—Minister for Water, Minister for Police) (12:38): I move:

That the debate be now adjourned.

Motion agreed to and debate adjourned.

Ordered that debate be adjourned until later this day.