What has happened to gambling reform under Labor? It’s simple – the government has been cowed by vested interests | Tim Costello

I had a visit on Sunday this week from a secondary school teacher who was asking how he can help his students who are all underage and who have sports betting apps and accounts.

He is distressed that they have absorbed the gambling ad message and that their passion for sport is expressed through gambling.

I assured him that given Labor and the Coalition would legislate a ban on social media for 16-year-olds they cannot enforce, it was surely a fait accompli that we would see a gambling ad ban which they can enforce.

Exactly the same anxiety that parents feel about social media, they feel about gambling ads grooming their kids. Just a few hours later I saw the news that the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, seems to have squibbed any gambling ad reform at all.

I was profoundly shocked. A year ago, I had witnessed the emotion of the PM when he spoke at Peta Murphy’s funeral and I had been assured that Labor would honour her groundbreaking legacy on gambling reform. I honestly believed that.

She showed us the pathway to address one of our biggest health issues, in the country with the world’s highest per-capita gambling losses.

The only question, I believed, was whether they would adopt her recommendation for a full ad ban or legislate just a partial ban.

Would they move gambling out of racing and sport to address it in our health departments? Would they implement a national gambling regulator or continue to allow the Northern Territory to continue as the de facto regulator of these ads?

But to squib any reform at all, and dishonour her legacy so totally, never entered my mind.

What has just happened?

Well, it was not public opinion that defeated any reform. More than 70% of the public wanted a full ad ban and everyone wanted some limits placed on the ubiquity of these predatory ads normalising gambling in children’s minds with the AFL and NRL.

The AFL supporters’ survey showed that 76% wanted a gambling ad ban from TV and radio. With more than a million ads a year on free-to-air television, the Australian public has had enough.

There is a collective psychic vomit every time an ad appears, as well as parental incomprehension about why, 18 months after the Murphy inquiry, our children are still being subjected to this.

Peter Dutton knew this. Months before the Murphy recommendations were handed down, he promised in his 2023 budget reply to limit gambling ads and received an overwhelmingly positive response.

The Coalition has not responded to Murphy and was waiting to react to the government’s response. Now that the government has squibbed any reform, Dutton has a big opportunity.

What happened is pretty simple in my view. The vested interests cowed the PM into dishonouring Murphy’s legacy. Those vested interests start with the obscenely rich foreign-owned sports betting companies.

The British online gambling company Bet365 is well connected through their peak body Responsible Wagering Australia, which had former Labor senator Stephen Conroy as CEO followed by former Liberal chief of staff Kai Cantwell.

Sporting bodies are often associated with gambling companies. The former CEO of the AFL is now CEO of Tabcorp. The AFL have been lobbying the PM not to implement the Murphy recommendations. Peter V’Landys is the chair of the NRL as well as chief executive and board member with NSW Racing. Media companies Seven, Nine and Foxtel have also been lobbying against the Murphy recommendations.

In the same week that the federal government squibbed reform, the gambling industry achieved other successes. The Tasmanian government backflipped on its pokies reforms even though public opinion supports a cashless card. Tasmania Labor supported the Liberals signing the death warrant for promised reform.

In New South Wales, the pokies industry sitting at the table of the premier Chris Minns’ expert panel has slowed down any cashless card reform to way beyond the next election. To have them at the table is a bit like having tobacco at the table to get smoking reform.

In the US, despite overwhelming public desire to get gun reform, guns remain entrenched and it remains the US’s blind spot. In Australia, despite overwhelming desire to get gambling reform, gambling remains entrenched.

What now seems clear is that, a year after her death, the recommendations of the brave Peta Murphy with multi-partisan support showed us a path forward, but our government caved in to vested interests.