“As we settled into the footy finals – advertisements bombarded us in attempts to persuade us that we may enjoy the game more if we have money on it,” MLA Marisa Paterson tells MICHAEL MOORE. 

SICK of seeing gambling advertisements on television and in your social media? Want to take some action? 

Although it might be last minute, it could be worth getting a submission into the House of Representatives Committee on online gambling and its impacts on those experiencing gambling harm before submissions close on Friday (November 11).

A faster and simpler way to have your voice heard is to support the community petition being conducted on her website by Labor MLA Dr Marisa Paterson. The “Bets off. Game on – Reclaim the Game” petition is designed to add a strong public voice to her submission to the federal inquiry. 

Dr Paterson argues: “It is time to reclaim our sport from the hands of gambling corporations” and suggests that “sports are at the heart of our nation and are a core part of the Australian identity”.

“There is a dark side to our sport, as we settled into the footy finals – advertisements bombarded us in attempts to persuade us that we may enjoy the game more if we have money on it”. 

The MLA is not on her own. There are already a number of submissions on the committee’s website. 

The Australia Institute’s Bill Browne, for example, argues: “There is broad, popular support for banning gambling advertising on TV, which would help limit children’s exposure”. 

Similarly, David Warr, the CEO of Gamblock, recommends to the committee that “gambling help bodies have fully transparent disclosure of their funding sources”.

Before entering politics, Dr Paterson was director of the Centre for Gambling Research at the ANU. As a researcher in this area she is in a strong position to present strong evidence before calling on ACT residents to support the petition. 

At the time of writing, there were around a thousand signatures. It should be more.

The statistics she quotes in attempting to get signatories to her petition include that more than 1.4 million Australians are harmed by gambling, gambling advertisements target our children and 35 per cent of people who bet online on sports or special events experience harm from gambling. These sorts of statistics should make us all stand up and listen.

Advertising of online gambling saturates our television. According to the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation, “in 2021, 148 gambling ads were broadcast on free-to-air during primetime family viewing hours of 6pm-8.30pm every weeknight”.

I asked Dr Paterson why she is collecting signatures on a federal issue when she was elected as a member of the ACT Legislative Assembly. I also asked if she will just be presenting the outcome of the petition to the members of the House of Representatives Committee. 

She sees the issue as affecting people in the ACT as well as across Australia and the petition will help inform part of her submission to the committee. However, the submission will largely focus on advertising.

She told me: “The petition will form part of the submission, but I will further elaborate regarding the impact on children in particular and the general harms associated with gambling. 

“Once it was just gambling on sports and now it is embedded in sport. As an example, you can see gambling advertisements on jerseys and on-ground advertising”.

Paterson then pointed to the “Pointsbet Stadium” – the home of the Cronulla Sharks. This is the club that has the support of former Prime Minister Scott Morrison. 

However, according to the ABC, of the $18 million of gambling revenue received by political parties in recent years, “more than three-quarters flowed to the ALP and its investment vehicle, the 1973 Foundation Pty Ltd”. The article added that in the ACT, “in the decade to June 2020, gambling-related groups poured some $6.5 million into party coffers”. 

Paterson argues that this support for Labor in the ACT has changed in the last half decade. 

When asked about contributions of gambling companies to deal with the harms they facilitate, she expressed real doubts that contributions could go anywhere near the harm created by this industry. 

The issues around gambling are complex. Using the “gamble responsibly” tagline has already been ditched by Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth in a recent announcement. It will be replaced with seven new options that she says have been chosen after “extensive research”. Hopefully, this is just a first step.

Michael Moore is a former member of the ACT Legislative Assembly and an independent minister for health. He has been a political columnist with “CityNews” since 2006.