Earlier this year, The Canberra Times highlighted the shocking indifference of the gambling industry to community harm, exacerbated by failures of the ACT regulator. One of Canberra’s wealthiest clubs has shown disregard for the importance of protecting its own members from harm, while the Gambling and Racing Commission, the regulatory body, has taken years to investigate and implement safety measures. This situation is yet another clear indication that the poker machine regulation system in Canberra is flawed. The tragedy of Ray Kasurinen’s suicide, following the loss of over $345,000 by he and his partner at the Hellenic Club, is made even more heartbreaking by the fact that it was not an isolated incident, but rather a foreseeable and preventable one.

The Canberra Gambling Reform Alliance (CGRA) has a vision for the Canberra community to have the lowest possible levels of the harm from gambling, through a policy approach focused on preventative public health and robust consumer protection. We want to see the next ACT Government support a reduction in the cost to individuals, families and the community caused by gambling, including gambling-related crime, health and mental health impacts, suicide and financial distress and hardship.

At the moment it appears our political system is paralysed to act. Legislation before ACT parliament this month to reduce EGM licenses by a few hundred, whilst welcomed, will do little to protect people from the harms caused by poker machines. We acknowledge Labor’s platform to introduce carded EGM (electronic gambling machine) gambling with pre-commitment and breaks in play, is a step in the right direction, it does not go far enough to protect or prevent people and their families experiencing gambling harm. We need a complete overhaul of the regulatory regime.

Unfortunately until adequate reforms to both the club gambling landscape and the regulatory environment are made, we will continue to see our community harmed by poker machines. In the case of the Hellenic Club, instead of dissuading the Kasurinens from using the poker machines, the Hellenic Club followed the club industries usual practice of joining them up to a VIP program, giving them expensive meals and drinks and other inducements, to keep them gambling. This was despite multiple members of their family, on multiple occasions, asking the Hellenic Club to exclude them from the gambling room.

What is most galling: when called out for these behaviours by the CT, the chief executive of the Hellenic Club, Ian Cameron, stated: “Any claim that the Hellenic Club failed Mr Ray Kasurinen or his family or that there was any indication of potential gaming harm to him or them are unfounded and are denied by the club.”

No contrition. No remorse. No indication that the club understands its responsibility and duty of care, to do better and implement better safeguards for its own club members and the broader community.

This is not an isolated sentiment, but reflects a widespread view from clubs bosses and the broader gambling industry. Fundamentally it’s why the ACT has not made any major progress on meaningful reform to protect vulnerable people and the community for decades. Club bosses and their enablers and boosters just don’t get it. As operators of a dangerous product that is intentionally designed to addict and is proven to cause serious harms to users and their families, the onus is on clubs to protect people. The cost of reasonable safeguards needs to be borne by the clubs and industry itself. This is what we expect from those who profit from other dangerous products, from drugs to guns and even motor vehicles – so why is it different in the gambling industry?

Instead, what we hear from club bosses is that it is ‘not their fault’ when a foreseeable tragedy occurs.

We need to put the responsibility to protect the community back on clubs and back on the industry. We are a long way from this goal. Canberra has one of the most unsafe and poorly regulated gambling regimes, not just in Australia but the world. The regulation of Canberra’s poker machines must ensure that consumers are protected against the harms associated with the risks of using a product that is known to cause harm.

Australia has the highest annual gambling losses per person in the world – $1300 per adult, totalling more than $25 billion – fuelled by high poker machine use and online gambling. There is one poker machine for every 124 residents of Canberra, one of the worst rates for any state or territory, with Canberrans losing $188m on poker machines in the last financial year alone.

Best practice safeguards require a central monitoring system to improve transparency and to allow daily and monthly betting caps so that people’s losses don’t get out of control. Close family members who have directly experienced theft or financial abuse as a result of gambling should have the right protect themselves from further harm by excluding their loved one from poker machine venues.

To better protect the community, we are calling on political candidates at the upcoming ACT elections to commit to these and the following common-sense measures:

• Stronger public health approach to reducing harm across all demographics transferring oversight of the Gambling Harm reduction fund to ACT Health in consultation with lived experience and the purpose of the fund focused entirely on resourcing research into harm reduction and evidence-based treatment programs across all forms of gambling
• Improved transparency about the harm caused by individual gambling venues. There should Annual public reporting of financial losses by each gambling venue, the number of people self-excluded by each venue and information about implementation and results of compliance and red-flag audits of gambling venues.
• Ensure gambling venues take responsibility for protecting vulnerable people. The regulator should be given the power to remove EGM licenses from venues engaging in predatory practices including advertising or promoting gambling to people who have self-excluded.
• Safer gambling venue hours. Given evidence that the most harmful gambling occurs after midnight, ban venues from operating poker machines between 2am and 10am each day.
• Fund a gambling harm advocacy peak. There is currently no organisation funded by ACT Government to advocate on behalf of individuals and families harmed by the gambling industry and to research and seek better outcomes for the Canberra community.

Kate Seselja and Jeremy Halcrow are Co-Chairs of the Canberra Gambling Reform Alliance