The New South Wales government has not set targets to reduce the harm caused by about 90,000 poker machines in the state and does not know if it is protecting people, according to a damning audit.
The state’s auditor general has also said the NSW government is doing “relatively little” to assess whether pubs and clubs are identifying and preventing gambling harm at their venues.
The report assesses government conduct from 2019 to mid-2024 across Labor and Coalition governments, but is likely to add to political pressure on the Minns government. Last week, a leading charity accused it of not doing enough to prevent serious harm caused by pokies.
The Department of Creative Industries, Tourism, Hospitality and Sport’s “strategy for regulating gaming machines is not based on a clear understanding of current levels of gambling harm and it does not set any targets for reducing harm associated with gaming machines,” the audit report said.
“The department does not have benchmarks, targets or other performance measures in place to assess outcomes against key measures of harm minimisation.
“There have been no evaluations of its compliance programs to measure their impact on harm minimisation outcomes. As a result, the department does not know whether its regulatory strategy is effective in minimising gambling harm.”
The audit report said gambling harm appears to have increased despite the government’s efforts.
“Calls to the GambleAware helpline increased by 8.5% in 2023–24 and gaming machine losses have increased in each of the last three years,” the report said. “The results of the 2024 NSW Gambling Survey did not indicate a reduction in the level of gambling harm in NSW.”
The report confirmed revenue from gambling taxes would increase from $2.47bn this financial year to $2.91bn in 2027-28.
“The forecast increase in gaming machine profits is due to expected increases in the use of gaming machines,” the report said.
The chair of the state’s independent liquor and gaming authority, Caroline Lamb, supported all recommendations from the audit.
“We propose to take a more structured approach to stakeholder engagement and acknowledge our responsibility, in conjunction with hospitality and racing, to ensure licensees meet their statutory obligations,” Lamb said.
The state’s gaming minister, David Harris, said the government “takes harm minimisation seriously and has implemented a number of initiatives”.
These initiatives include reducing the cash limit on new machines from $5,000 to $500, banning external signage at venues, putting more responsible gaming officers in venues and investing $100m in a gambling harm minimisation fund.
But Wesley Mission’s chief executive, Stu Cameron, believes these “limited reforms” are “clearly not having an impact”.
“While we didn’t need an audit to know the system is broken, as frontline services have been saying this for years, now it is in black and white: the NSW government has done next to nothing to reduce gambling harm while clubs and hotels pocket billions.”
In November last year, an independent panel advising the government on gambling reform wrote a “roadmap” for overhauling the state’s regulation of poker machines and limiting harm. The Minns government is yet to formally respond to the report’s recommendations, which were contested by some panel members.
Labor had promised to force poker machines to be made cashless by 2028, but a pilot of a gaming scheme attracted only 32 participants.
The project was subsequently criticised by the Australian Hotels Association – whose members operate poker machines – which questioned the evidence base for further action.
“The research findings of the cashless gaming trial are embarrassing and not credible,” an AHA spokesperson said after preliminary results of the trial were released.
ClubsNSW said the cashless gaming trial had a “significantly low uptake” and said calls for it to become mandatory were based on “no economic modelling” about its potential impacts.
“With only 14 genuine and active users participating in the trial, such a low adoption should necessitate a cautious, measured, voluntary approach to implementation of account-based gaming, rather than a short timeframe for a statewide, mandatory rollout,” ClubsNSW said in December last year.
The shadow minister for gaming, Kevin Anderson, said “gambling losses continue to skyrocket in NSW while the independent panel’s report gathers dust on the desks of the premier and minister”.
“The Minns government must urgently respond to the recommendations in that report to give the community and the industry certainty of the path forward.”
