When Julia Gillard’s Labor Party formed a minority government in the aftermath of the 2010 Federal election, Parliament House became a house of cards: carefully constructed, delicately balanced and vulnerable to disruption from almost every side. On one side we have the ALP; they are the spades in this particular deck, traditionally representing the working class and doing everything they can to maintain their hold on the reins. On the other side we have the diamonds; the Independents and the Greens who aligned themselves with Labor, and whose support is priceless in keeping the status quo.
The hearts in this deck are represented by the deal struck between Gillard and Independent MP for Denison Andrew Wilkie. This deal, calling for the national introduction of mandatory pre-commitment technology for poker machines, sits at the heart of the minority government, as Wilkie has said repeatedly that he will withdraw his support should the agreement not be honoured.
That’s three suits, but a deck of cards has four. It is becoming increasingly clear that the clubs in this house of cards could be the most important suit of all, and could intentionally bring the whole structure crashing down.
The clubs, of course, are ClubsNSW and ClubsAustralia.
The clubs movement has a long history of political and social power and influence in New South Wales. They have been an entrenched part of the fabric of the state for decades, and there is no denying that millions of Australians are club members, and make use of their facilities every day. There is also no denying that the clubs do give some of their money back to the community, supporting a range of groups and junior & professional sports. However, the clubs of today are a far cry from what they used to be.
The clubs movement has become almost completely dependent upon gambling revenue for their continued day-to-day operations. Not so much the smaller and more regional clubs; they are still generally community-based, and operate in much the same fashion as they always have. Yes, they have poker machines but the purpose of these clubs is still to provide a central hub for their local communities, and that governs the way they operate.
The larger and more powerful clubs, however, are a different story. They have forgotten what it means to truly be a part of the local community; instead, they have become sprawling entertainment complexes, incorporating bowling alleys and commercial hotels like Novotel, and proudly offering dubious community benefits such as cheap beer and schnitzels for members. These larger clubs run hundreds of poker machines; they amalgamate with other smaller clubs and take on their gaming machine licences; and the revenue they make from their pokies pays for almost everything. These clubs spend more on social expenses and advertising than they do on community donations, yet they maintain the illusion of respectability by continuing to trumpet the not-for-profit, community-based line.
The sorry truth of the matter is that these clubs have expanded too far, too fast. Even with the massive amount of money being sucked out of their communities by their poker machines, many are treading a fine line in terms of managing their debts, and as a result any threat to their pokie revenue is met with outrage and rejection not only by the clubs, but by their ruling bodies as well.
This is nothing new. When the matter of smoking bans was raised several years ago, ClubsNSW and ClubsAustralia were extremely vocal in their opposition to this move. There were dire predictions that smoking bans would cause countless clubs to go out of business. It’s an indictment on the industry that NSW was the last state to implement smoking bans in clubs and hotels; more, several clubs have gone on to build outdoor gaming areas (known as al fresco gambling) which are often nothing more than a room with a wall removed. These al fresco gambling areas allow pokie players to keep playing while they smoke, and the figures show that these areas actually make more money for the clubs than traditional gaming rooms.
More recently the NSW government set about increasing the rate of tax that registered clubs in NSW had to pay. Once again ClubsNSW and ClubsAustralia flexed their political might, warning of the end of the clubs movement in NSW and campaigning long and hard to block the taxation increases. This situation fractured the previously strong relationship between ClubsNSW and the NSW Labor Party, and it’s no surprise that the NSW Coalition have signalled that they will reduce club taxes when they form government. It’s also no surprise that club-based donations to the NSW Coalition have increased drastically while donations to NSW Labor have sharply fallen away.
Yet for all this hysteria, all these foretellings of doom, the clubs movement in NSW remains strong. The industry hasn’t collapsed. And clubs continue to make countless millions of dollars from their poker machines, while only funnelling a fraction back to the community.
This brings us back to mandatory pre-commitment, the latest “threat” to the clubs movement and the trigger for the latest round of angry denials and scathing press releases from ClubsNSW and ClubsAustralia. But this time, things are different. This isn’t a local state-based fight any more; this is a national issue, and while the clubs movement is a national one, with branches in every state and territory, it is ClubsNSW that wields the power. They’re fighting on the national stage now, and the stakes couldn’t be higher.
It requires no stretch of the imagination to suggest that this time around, the ultimate goal of the clubs movement is to bring down the Federal government.
Consider this: the clubs movement exists to serve the community. That is their reason for being. It’s not unreasonable to expect that when the Federal government announces plans to implement a process that would seriously tackle the issue of problem gambling, an issue that affects tens, even hundreds of thousands of Australians and indirectly impacts on so many more, the clubs movement would at least give the idea due consideration. After all, their members are among those who are impacted by the plight of problem gambling in this country, and the communities they exist to serve are the same communities that are counting the cost.
The reality is very different. The day after the Gillard-Wilkie deal was announced, and mandatory pre-commitment technology for poker machines first became a national political issue, ClubsNSW and ClubsAustralia hit the press denouncing it as a savage attack on all clubs, one that would kill off the clubs movement completely. There was no community or industry consultation, no assessment of what the agreement entailed, no discussion with the government. The concept was flatly rejected out of hand.
In the ensuing months, the clubs continued to work the media. They focussed on the possibility of biometric scanning as a pre-commitment option, and suddenly the papers were full of stories about fingerprinting pokie players “like criminals”. No one was talking about the fact that fingerprinting drinking patrons in NSW clubs is a common practice.
The clubs movement executives then hit the road, visiting regional areas and telling local managers how much it would cost to roll out the required technology in their clubs, and how many millions of dollars would be lost. This practice continues, even though the nature of the final mandatory pre-commitment technology solution has yet to be determined. There is no possible way that the clubs, let alone anyone else, can know exactly how much it will cost to implement, or how much revenue will be lost, as the solution is yet to be decided, but that hasn’t stopped the clubs. Local papers in NSW are full of stories about this travelling roadshow, but there has not been one article printed in the past six months that details how much money gamblers are currently spending on pokies in NSW.
ClubsNSW even attacked the validity of the Productivity Commission’s Report into Gambling, a report that has been years in the making and is considered the benchmark of gambling research in this country. Mandatory pre-commitment is one of the Report’s recommendations.
The clubs movement has said, time and time again, that mandatory pre-commitment will not help problem gamblers. They say it will only drive recreational gamblers away, as these pokie players would refuse to get a smart-card in order to play the pokies. They say that this will cause a 40% drop in revenue for clubs across the country, while problem gamblers will continue to feed their addictions. Yet they make these claims without a shred of proof. There is no doubt that if the clubs supported mandatory pre-commitment, and were actively involved in designing a workable solution that was simple to understand and easy to use, then their members would have no problem with the solution. After all, club members already have to consent to showing 100 points of ID and having their photo taken, simply to obtain their memberships; getting a pre-commitment smart-card will in all likelihood be a very similar process. No, what the clubs movement is trying to do is influence public opinion to suit their own ends.
So the clubs oppose mandatory pre-commitment, not because they’ve consulted with their members and have decided that it’s the right thing to do, but because they know that it will impact on the one thing that is most precious to them: their revenue. But if there’s one thing that the clubs are surely aware of, it’s that this is a unique situation. The house of cards that is the Federal government is dependent upon mandatory pre-commitment for poker machines, and is this fails, then Andrew Wilkie withdraws his support… and the house of cards falls.
That is the aim of the clubs movement in NSW. No majority government has ever tackled gambling reform in this fashion, and should this reform push fail, Australia would go back to the polls. It is almost guaranteed that no matter who wins government on that day, gambling reform will no longer be on the agenda; and the clubs will once again be free to do what they will.
This week, ClubAustralia will launch their advertising campaign against mandatory pre-commitment technology. They’ve committed $20 million to this campaign and hired John Singleton to run the show, no doubt because of the campaign he ran for them opposing tax hikes a few years back. $20 million might sound like a lot of money, and given most of it comes from pokie revenue it definitely is; but the Clubs obviously think it’s a small price to pay to bring down a government.
March 22nd, 2011 on 11:12 am
The problems with the clubs are they are providing their facilities at the expense of the problem gamblers. As if that was not bad enough they are operating cheating devices.
March 28th, 2011 on 6:50 am
Like bogus charities who set themselves up to target the lucrative ‘recycled / donated goods’ industry in the 1980-90′s….under guise of supporting eg ‘abused children’ to win sympathy and support…our clubs are now doing the same.
It is ‘all about the money for my wages’ MUCH rather than it is ‘all about our great clubs that help people’!
GO WILKIE!!!! Agree with him all the way!
April 25th, 2011 on 6:46 pm
couldn’t agree with all this more. why do none of the major papers do a proper analysis of a few clubs to show the general public, that by and large, none of their activities make a profit apart from poker machines, and that this money is used to subsidise the other activities, and to expand the size of clubs – to what end i will never understand. the money they give to the community is nothing compared to what is spent on capital improvements. Through my professional dealings with club management i often get the impression that it is the CEO personalities that drive all the expansion – ‘my club is bigger than your club’ – as if they were all teenage boys. i also see a lack of professionalism in the way clubs are run – complain about the behaviour of their staff and they will close ranks against you and deny everything without investigation – more like a corrupt police force than a club that the ‘community’ owns.
April 26th, 2011 on 9:56 am
Some of the clubs do very good work, especial the RSL’s.
I think the RSL in Victoria was sucked into the promise of riches attached to pokie machines way back in the 90′s. Generally, people were not so aware of the potential problems then.
Now the RSL’s have also become dependent on pokie revenue. Their memberships are ageing and the RSL as an organisation would have to do a lot of work to create a new vision and business model. The RSL’s have been better than other clubs in their community contributions. One would have to sympathize with them and hope they are helped in any adjustment necessary. I doubt that they really knew what they were getting into.
The worst of this current campaign against pre-commitment seems to come from Clubs Australia, principally based in NSW as far as I know. Mind you, the AFL in Victoria would lobby strongly against any restrictions on gaming. I question the need for AFL clubs to have gaming machines given the millions that go into the football industry from media rights.
A friend of mine uses a local RSL. At this particular club there has been a downturn in pokie revenue, possibly because of the GFC. The club is now having to recruit new members and charge them a $150pa membership fee. They may also have to cut services. It is a good example of how some of the clubs are in difficulty because they expected the pokie cash cow to last forever.
The gambling industry, Governments and the kind of society we live in are all largely responsible for the current situation. However, the funding of community clubs and the profits of ALH and other parts of the hotel industry can no longer be based on the suffering of compulsive gamblers. Even those people who gamble casually on pokies often suffer because they have low incomes anyway and the quality of their lives is diminished wth any loss of income.
Any society which would allow this kind of suffering for gain is on the road to nowhere.
April 28th, 2011 on 3:54 pm
Why charge just the RSL members? Why not levy all pokies users and charge them an annual fee to use pokies, as well? Their pokies habits are risky…and no doubt clubs would not have to rely on the RSL so much for help if they could get more help from the government. Pokies users have to start paying for the govt. costs that their recreation creates, like all drivers have to do. Pokies users must be part of the solution. They can’t expect just to go around having fun all the time at the pokies and expect everyone else to have to pay! Part of the levy could also assist RSL clubs!