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Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It's Friday, the sixteenth of August. I'm zara, I'm billy. Should online gambling ads be banned altogether? Now? That's the question that's currently in front of the government as they weigh up how to deal with Australia's gambling problem. While a committee report last year recommended a total ban on all online gambling advertising, there are now reports that the government won't go for a total ban, but instead a partial one.
In today's deep Dive, we're going to explore what the fallout from those reports have been, what the government's options are, and what we can expect next. But first, Billy, what's making headlines.
Opposition leader Peter Dudden has doubled down on calls for a temporary immigration pause on people fleeing gars. Dunnan introduced a motion in Parliament yesterday claiming that some of nearly three thousand visas granted by the government, two individuals from Gaza have gone to applicants who have quote express sympathy for Hamas. Prime Minister Anthony Albanesi accused Dudden of sowing
quote fear and division over Palestinian visas. Independent MP Zali Stegl also spoke out against Duddin's motion, calling it racist, before then withdrawing her remark.
Australia's unemployment rate rose slightly from four point one percent to four point two percent in July. That's according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The unemployment rate reflects the percentage of people who were looking for work but couldn't find any. July marks the highest that unemployment has been
since November twenty twenty one. Despite the number of employed people increasing by an extra fifty eight thousand people last month, The Reserve Bank of Australia forecasts the unemployment rate will rise to four point three percent by the end of twenty twenty four.
Tens of thousands of women in the Indian state of West Bengal have protested against sexual violence. It follows the rape and murder of a trainee doctor at a Kolcuta hospital. Federal police have taken over investigations after local authorities were accused of negligence and cover ups. Demonstrators, including thousands of doctors, are calling for better security measures to keep women and medical professionals.
Safe and today's good news. Researchers have been given new insight into life in the ancient Roman city of Pompeii. Archaeologists announced this week they've unearthed two skeletons, coins, and jewelry that were believed to have been buried when Mount Vesuvius erupted nearly two thousand years ago. Officials say that discovery offered invaluable anthropological data about the ancient city and
its residents. So Billy Parliament resumed this week. It was the first sitting week back after an extended winter break, and the big time that everyone seems to be talking about is gambling. That's because the government's currently preparing to introduce its legislation to deal with the rise in online gambling. Now. I do think that sometimes we talk about gambling, but we don't really set out the problem, and I think that it's important to set out the problem so that
we know what the government is trying to solve. The issue is this, Australians spend and lose more money to gambling than people in any other country in the world. Deestimated that as a country, we collectively lose twenty five billion dollars in bets every single year.
That's wild.
Yeah, it's a crazy statistic. And so in twenty twenty two, the government identified that this was an issue and they referred the matter to a committee, and that committee was tasked with coming up with some recommendations on how to deal with this rise in online gambling and also to look at its effects on those actually experiencing online gambling harm.
Okay, so that committee handed down its final report in June of last year. Can you tell me a bit about that?
Yeah, So I do think that there are a few things to note about this committee because committee's hand down reports all the time, and like normal people outside of you and I don't often pay close attention to those committee reports. But this one is really different. And it's because this committee was chaired by the late Labor MP Peter Murphy, who died from cancer in December of last year.
So the committee that she was leading recommended that the government should adopt a full ban on online gambling advertisements in a phased approach. And so the reason that this is coming up and that this is becoming such a big talking point is because that recommendation that I just said is largely seen as Peter Murphy's legacy. So you know, she was this really beloved member of the Labor Party, and now people are saying that, however the government responds,
here is more than just about gambling. It's also about honoring Peter Murphy's legacy.
Okay, so Murphy letter committee that recommended a total ban on online gambling advertising. That was in June of last But why are we talking about it today.
Yeah, and so we haven't heard from the government since then. So usually when a committee hands down a report, the government takes some time to consider what's in that report and then they formally respond. And so the conversation now is that the government is getting ready to formally respond, and that that formal response, from what we are hearing,
isn't what the committee actually recommended. So I want to just really quickly read out exactly what the recommendation was, because I think then you can compare it to what we're hearing the government is going to try and propose.
So the exact recommendation that the committee led by Peter Murphy made was the Committee recommends that the Australian Government, with a cooperation of the States and territories, implement a comprehensive ban on all forms of advertising for online gambling to be introduced in four phases over three years, commencing immediately. And so they're not suggesting there that tomorrow you turn off all online gambling ads. They're saying, this needs to be a phased approach, but there needs to be the
plan to phase it out entirely. But that doesn't seem to be the way that the government is going. And so earlier this month this story made its way back into the headlines because the nine newspapers reported that a government is now considering a partial ban rather than the full ban that was recommended.
What's also interesting about that is that Peter Murphy was Labor and this is a labor government responding.
And that's why it's so tense, because they're saying, you tasked this former Labor MP with bringing you answers, and she is no longer there and you are not doing what she recommended. Like it's also a really deeply emotional thing. You know, I've never read about someone who was more beloved by a party, and so now it's it's feeling quite personal, which is a really interesting element to it.
So Murphy recommended a total ban. We now know that the government is more considering a partial ban. What do we know about what a partial ban would look like.
Well, again, I think it's important to know that the government hasn't explicitly said anything on the record. We are relying quite a bit on what the nine papers are reporting. And what they're reporting is that instead of a total ban, Labor is now looking at adopting a cap of two gambling ads per hour on each channel until ten pm, and then banning ads an hour before and an hour after live sport. That's just what's being reported, but it
does seem that that's picking up steam. And already we've had a lot of people come out and criticize that proposal.
Who is criticizing it and what exactly are their criticisms.
Well, the criticism is coming from both inside and outside the camp. When I say inside the camp, we've had some Labor MPs who are part of the current government coming out and saying, no, we need to do this full ban, it's an imperative. We had Labor backbencher Mike Friedlander, who's a doctor, saying that a total ban is the only possible answer from a public health perspective. So that is someone of the same government coming out and say nah,
we cannot do what is being proposed right now. Then, in terms of broader criticisms, we've had an open letter this week from the Alliance for Gambling Reform that said a tsunami of one million gambling ads are shown on free to AIRTV and radio every year, and that open letter is calling for this full ban. Interestingly, it was signed by quite high profile Australian figures, people like John Howard, ex Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull also an ex Prime minister.
We had Dom Perrete, the ex Premier from New South Wales, and Steve Brax, the X Premier in Victoria. So we're kind of getting a full spectrum of political opinions here saying you have to go with the full ban. It is a balancing act though for the government because they've got these loud voices, but then they've also got loud voices on the other side from the gambling industry and from the media industry who are saying no, this won't work.
I do think it's interesting exploring the media industry's perspective a little bit more because a lot of free to air channels, so you think of your nines and your sevens. A lot of people are saying that they are really quite reliant on the advertising money coming from gambling companies. And we know that it's not controversial to say that TV is a dying industry and to keep it alive, they right now are very reliant on that money, and so that comes into the balancing act.
Yeah, and we've heard a lot of that sort of argument being made. I was listening to an interview of the CEO from Free TV, so she's representing all of those channels, saying that this will put a hole in the bottom line of these media companies and that then in turn, they can't fund the public interest journalism.
And then the counter to that is that this was a debate that they were having about the tobacco industry a number of decades ago, exactly, and ultimately they did ban tobacco advertising and that was done to the benefit of everyone's overall health and that was a positive.
Yeah. Well, interesting you bring up that example because Bill Shorten earlier this week. So gambling is not the same as tobacco, and so the government's quite clearly trying to differentiate the two, even though there are those around who are saying, no, these are both public health crises, and look at how you dealt with one, you need to deal with the other one in exactly the same way. But yeah, the media is certainly one part. But then obviously the other group that aren't stoked about this is
the betting companies themselves. Again, a lot of this is happening behind closed doors, so I read that, you know, some of these companies have had to sign NDAs before entering into meetings with the Minister for Communications about this, So we don't know a whole lot, but from some reporting around, we've seen that the betting companies are acknowledging something will need to be done, and instead of wanting a full ban, they're offering to remove their logos from
sporting jerseys. So that's one proposal from them. The other is that they'd offer to remove any advertising from radios during school pickup time, So again that's more of a partial ban. I mean, I don't even know if that's really a ban, but it's more trying to find some solutions within the current frame work that will allow them to continue advertising.
Okay, so there is all of this pressure on the government. It is a very fine Balancing Act. We know what is being reported and you know kind of the rumors of what they're saying, but what is actually on the record by the politicians.
Not a whole lot. We had Harry from our office reach out to Michelle Roland, she's the Communications Minister, and her office said the status quo of online wagering advertising is untenable. She added that the government was continuing to speak with harm reduction advocates, health experts in industry before it tables any legislation. But again that's not really telling
us anything we don't know. On the other side of politics, we had Liberal Senator Jane Hume say on Q and A earlier this week that you have to find the right balance. She said, it's not an illegal pastime. Adults can participate by choice.
So that shows that, you know, again within parties, within the Liberal Party, there is not consensus about what should be done on this issue.
Exactly. A Liberal elder in John Howard is saying you need a total ban and that a current coalition senator Jane Hume is saying the opposite. So interesting, it is quite a divisive topic. One person that's come out fairly strongly out the Gates. Here is Independent Senator David Pocock. He has just essentially said the government must back a full ban and that they need to show courage and that they need to go and do this even if
it is tough. So we've got kind of a fairly aligned cross bench there behind Pocock saying you have to do this.
And so next week there will be another sitting week. Are we expecting them to table that legislation next week?
I mean, given all of the talk and all of the hype, I think that they're going to have to act pretty soon and they can expect whatever happens based on what we've just said, that there will be blowback wherever they land, because there are so many different stakeholders here with so much to lose.
Okay, so one to watch. This is a story I've seen everywhere this week, and I feel like it's another time that I want to say, oh no makes sentence. Thank you so much, Sarah, and thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Day. If you would like to help us grow, if you can click follow on Spotify or Apple, it really helps us grow. Or you might not know that we also record all of our podcasts on video and so you can go and watch us on YouTube and press subscribe over there.
Thank you so much, have a great weekend and we'll be back again on Monday. My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda Bungelung calcotton woman from Gadigol Country. The Daily oz acknowledges that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island and nations. We pay our respects to the first peoples of these countries, both past and present.