Advertising gambling during family programming

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I think that all levels of Government benefit from the Gambling Industry. Local Government with the rates, and other services and an interest in licensing of venues. State Government obviously gain from Gambling taxes/fees that are levied on establishments, contributions to Community funds and lobbying efforts. Federal Government obviously benefits from taxes and fees including from the sale of alcohol from these premises.

The Gaming Industry have an interest in getting the best deal they can from all levels of Government and part of their strength in their ability to get results is from the number of people employed in and around the industry. They also have close connections in the makeup of senior employees who have had Government jobs as either Public Servants and as elected Representatives.

The Industry assessment of their importance

The possible conflict assessment

The National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) may lead to more scrutiny of influence in Government particularly at a federal level, here’s hoping anyway.

From what I understand NSW State Government receives at least 1% of it’s total annual revenue from Gambling, revenue from all sources is around $103 Billion so a healthy $1 Billion at least from Gambling. Something the State could not really afford to upset the apple cart about.

Qld Government figures for 2019/2020 show a revenue figure of $1.18 Billion with a turnover of about $38 Billion or a per captia rate of expenditure of about $950 per person in Qld. I doubt the rate of spending has decreased.

The Qld Government released a report that tallies every State in Australia up to the 2019/2020 year.

The figures may be better or worse as some reporting data is no longer collected but it is perhaps a best effort based on incomplete knowledge.

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124

Oh yes “its only a harmless flutter”. The clubs have been pushing the lie for decades that the harm done is minor and doesn’t doesn’t warrant any control. Just because the majority do not come to great harm is not a reason to do nothing. And it is only normal in Oz. Why encourage young people to do such a stupid thing at all?

I am not saying ban gambling, prohibition doesn’t work. I am saying treat it like drinking, smoking and buying sex services that are adults pastimes permitted but where the hours and the means that you can advertise it are controlled.

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125

Well, they could but it would be a “courageous decision”. :wink:

Sure, $1b is not a trivial sum to replace.

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But they are, every time introducing afternoon coverage of the XYZ footy game etc opens with the odds of a particular team winning. The behaviour is reinforced with adds to bet with your mates using an App on your phone on just about anything that is close to two flys climbing up the wall.

We get to see advertising promoting gambling, especially on line gambling during many sporting events. The telecasts are live and well within family viewing times. Times of the day adult only content would not screen, for fear of difficult discussions between parents and children. I’m no prude, but it is a double standard. Why is it permitted to market gambling during viewing times accessible to those who can’t gamble?

It’s a simple question with an obvious answer.
And it’s not ‘gamble responsibly’.
Perhaps ‘gamble and you will almost always lose’ said loud and slowly at the end if each add would be reliable advice?

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127

I don’t think that gamblers care less that they lose often; they are after the BIG one that comes along on a few occasions.

And that big win is always just one more try away.

As for the Internet gambling via phones or other devices, it is all just online gaming, except there is real money involved. Social interconnection via groups. You have to be in it and gambling or you are not connected.

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My statement that gambling is normal, fun and harmless for a large percentage of the population is a fact, it is not a lie.

Last week there was a powerball draw boasting a $100 million jackpot. Numerous news services reported that around half of all Australian adults (not including me) purchased a ticket in the draw. This means around 10 million people had a bet on the outcome. If not winning caused great harm to even 1% of the losers we would have heard about it by now.

There are lots of controls already in place, if you have other suggestions you are free to make them to the appropriate authorities.

Last time I checked the globe, places like Nevada and Macau were not in Australia and Australians do not represent a large percentage of residents or visitors for either of these places.

The more than 2 million pachinko machines in Japan are not for the exclusive or predominant use of Australians.

English football has a vast worldwide audience, with a small percentage living in Australia. Sponsorship by bookies and casinos is very common. Are you suggesting that these organisations are spending their millions of pounds just to attract the attention of Australian viewers?

Jackpots amounts offered by overseas lotteries dwarf the highest Australian amounts.

I agree, young people don’t need to be encouraged by others to do stupid things. However if we banned all advertising and programming that encouraged stupid things, there would not be a lot left.

Firstly, there are controls relating to gambling advertising.

Secondly, there is an equal argument to say that voting, driving a car and borrowing money also have age related conditions. Perhaps gambling companies should be given the same freedom to advertise as political parties, car companies and finance companies. I am not seriously suggesting that this should be the case, but each category you and I have mentioned needs to be judged on its own merits (or lack thereof).

There are rules in place about this. This page gives details of those rules and a link to report any breaches. You should be able to avoid the gambling references by only watching at the times when they are banned.

Unless you have a very loose definition of “almost always” that statement would not be correct.

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129

If it is organised gambling where the house sets the odds it is absolutely correct. In the long run the only way to win at games that involves chance is to have the odds in your favour. There is no such animal within approved gambling in Oz. The reason is obvious, whether you own a pokie machine, run a book at the races or operate a lottery you are doing that to make a profit.

You might manage a quick “smash and grab” where you exploit a short term run of luck in your favour. For example, having turned 18 you go to the club and start putting some of your birthday gifts through the pokies, after a few presses you win a jackpot. Being supernaturally wise and calm at that age you collect your winnings and leave, never to repeat the experiment. Almost nobody ever does this because they get a big rush when they see the jokers line up and salute. This is what you are being sold, the chance of the rush, most people can control it and not put the rent in looking for it, some can’t.

If you are a well controlled casual gambler and play the pokies, horses or whatever regularly the laws of probability take over and the longer you play the more you lose.

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Indeed, we do hear about it even from Government Organisations and it is above 1% and worse for men than women.

Gambling in Australia - Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (aihw.gov.au)

"

Gambling-related problems and harms

Measuring gambling-related problems among people who gamble

Gambling-related problems are commonly assessed via the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI) (Ferris and Wynne 2001). The PGSI provides a measure of at-risk behaviour in problem gambling during the previous 12-month period. It consists of 9 items (questions), such as ‘have you bet more than you could really afford to lose?’, with response options being never (0), sometimes (1), most of the time (2) and almost always (3). Scores are summed for a total between 0 and 27. Respondents are grouped into 4 categories based on their scores: non-problem gambling (0), low-risk gambling (1–2), moderate-risk gambling (3–7), and problem gambling (8–27). Respondents scoring 1+ may be classified as being at some risk of, or already experiencing, gambling-related problems.

The PGSI was included in the HILDA Survey in 2015 and 2018; findings for Australian adults are presented in Figure 9, by sex and age group. Around 7.9% of Australians (an estimated 1.38 million people) were classified as being at some risk of experiencing gambling-related problems in 2015, reducing to around 7.2% (an estimated 1.33 million people) in 2018.

A higher percentage of men were at risk for gambling-related problems (10% in 2015; 9.2% in 2018) than women (5.7% in 2015; 5.3% in 2018). At-risk gambling among young people aged 18–34 increased slightly from 2015 (7.4%) to 2018 (8.1%) but decreased for older age groups (35–54: 8.3% in 2015, 6.3% in 2018; 55 and over: 8.0% in 2015; 7.4% in 2018)."

and additionally the number who are not problem gamblers but are affected by those with problem gambling are a much bigger problem

Gambling and affected others

In recent years, it has been increasingly recognised that gambling-related harms affect not only people who gamble, but also their families, friends, and the wider community (see, for example, Browne et al. 2016; Dowling 2014; Goodwin et al. 2017; Hing et al. 2020; Langham et al. 2016; Wardle et al. 2018).

Research conducted by Goodwin and colleagues (2017) examined how many people (on average) could be negatively affected by someone else’s at-risk gambling. The research found that a person experiencing problem gambling can affect up to 6 other people around them, moderate-risk gambling up to 3 others, and low-risk gambling up to 1 other. Close family members, including spouses and children, were most often identified as the people impacted by others’ gambling problems (see Goodwin et al. 2017 for more detail)."

Do we have a problem? Yes, it would seem quite a large one as pointed out in these articles.

Chart of the day: Are Australians the world’s biggest gambling losers? You can bet on it - ABC News

Aust gamblers the world’s biggest losers | The Canberra Times | Canberra, ACT

From estimated losses calculated by the H2 group (and referenced in the above 2 articles) we have the World’s highest per capita losses (from 2018/19 it was estimated at $25 Billion of losses) of around AU$1,000 to AU$1,300 depending on exchange rates per person or US$958 per person of our population (including minors who mostly wouldn’t be gambling).

Not quite as the exemptions do not apply during News, Sports, or Current Affairs programs for instance where Gambling Ads are indeed permitted and often occur.

"
Gambling ads during children’s programs | ACMA

Programs on commercial free-to-air television

During programs that are classified G, C and P, gambling ads are not permitted from 6am to 8.30am and 4pm to 7pm.

During other programs principally directed to children, gambling ads are not permitted between 5am and 8.30pm.

News, sports and current affairs programs are exempt from this rule but additional rules do apply during live sport."

So, if a channel has a news break every hour, they can display gambling ads every hour during those news breaks even in the banned times.

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Basically, yes. In the long run almost everyone will lose money in any form of gambling.

However that is limited in its analysis by only looking at dollars. If you look at it as entertainment or even as a social activity, you paid money (became poorer) but you got something in return. If a person looks at it as an investment then he or she is an idiot.

Well, plus, the reason is obvious: the government takes its cut.

So between the government’s cut and the private operator’s profit margin 
 the mathematical expectation has to be negative. You should expect to lose money in the long run.

The fundamental challenge: how to deal with the 7.2% while not shafting the 92.8%.

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There are forms available where the odds are not in favour of the house (as there is no house) so all the players are equal in being able to win or lose by chance. Some games involving chance also have a substantial component of skill so in the long run the better player will beat the weaker. But neither of those conditions apply to the public forms that you can access through an app or at a club that are carefully structured not to.

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I’m not asking that gambling be banned (I would prefer it from my perspective but others have a right to choose) and what you have posted seems to assume the banning of gambling. Rather than that, I am suggesting/opining that advertising be very strictly limited, much more than it is now just like tobacco and alcohol are more strictly controlled in what and how they can be advertised and indeed that warnings rather than pro ads be the public advertising allowed.

That doesn’t stop the larger majority from having their flutter, and in that 90 odd percent who don’t have problems are the under 18s who are not allowed to legally gamble anyway and nor should they be subject to promotion in our everyday media of gambling
it’s just a method to attract early interest and to normalise gambling to young minds. Nor does that 7.2% include the many more affected by that problem gambling of the 7.2%. Lots of reasons to heavily restrict ads about gambling.

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Nope. “Shafted” is inherently broad and encompasses a lot of things the government might do, most notably making it cashless and hence subject to corporate and government surveillance.

(This is so typical of how government operates. The LEAs want the surveillance for reasons utterly unrelated to what we are discussing here and they are prepared to go along with any argument, no matter how immoral their position might be, in order to get their way.)

I took your quoted figures to refer only to adults. So the 7.2% v. 92.8% is only within the subset of Australians who are adults. That is the only interpretation that I can put on the text that you included.

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No it is a percentage of all Australians from what I took to be the percentages they quoted, you may however be correct. Still a decent proportion of adults who are problem gamblers, and those additionally affected do include children and in all probability a greater percentage of the population who suffer from gambling issues. I have quoted their original percentage as they wrote it, they said Australians but did not say just adults. Perhaps they need to be clearer about who makes up the numbers.

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Yes, but multiply that out. If 7.9% is 1.38 million then 100% is a shade over 17 million, which can’t possibly therefore be all Australians, not even winding the clock back to 2015 (population somewhere north of 23 million).

Also, it does say “findings for Australian adults” - so I think they just dropped off the word “adults” for all the subsequent figures.

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As this thread has matured and become lengthy, we’ve started a new topic for ongoing discussion here.

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