It’s the first Tuesday in November. Melbourne Cup day. And as a Melburnian, I stopped along with so many others to watch the “great race”. No, I didn’t have a punt, although I have in years gone by; I simply couldn’t be bothered this year. But this isn’t about horse-racing, nor is it about all the hoopla that surrounds Melbourne’s Spring Carnival each year. This is about something else.

This is about Betstar.

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Yesterday I wrote about the ALH’s decision to pull gambling-style kids games from all of their venues across the country; that includes almost 100 venues in Victoria alone. It made a nice change to be able to write something good about this lot, especially given the Woolworths connection and the bad publicity they’ve been getting in the press (and deservedly so).

But any lingering happy thoughts I might have had about this were shattered when I learned last night that the Pink Hill Hotel, a proposed development in Beaconsfield, is planning on building a soundproof room, essentially a glass cage, to serve as a kids play area… and that this cage would overlook the 60-machine gaming room.

Are these people insane?

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It’s about time I made a start on what I like to call the Sneaky Bastards File. There are a number of means of gambling available in this country, including racing (horses and greyhounds), poker machines, casinos, sports betting and online gambling such as poker, pokies and casino games. Consequently, there are a number of laws and regulations covering different parts of the overall gambling industry. For the most part, these laws and regulations have been put in place to protect consumers and/or problem gamblers. Every now and then, however, someone finds a loophole or a way around these rules, and expolits it for their own benefit. And “exploit” is exactly the right word; making more money out of problem gamblers is nothing but exploitation.

Hence, the Sneaky Bastards File. And the first entrant into the file is the Malvern Vale hotel.

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