In the meantime, conflict was simmering away over poker machine reform between the state minister responsible for gambling, Victor Dominello, and ClubsNSW. Described as an MP with high ethical standards, Dominello appointed the 2019 inquiry into Crown – headed by retired judge Patricia Bergin – following media reports that organised crime had infiltrated Crown Casino in Melbourne. (We’ll examine these developments in Chapter 11.) Dominello then directed his sights at helping problem gamblers by cleaning up the poker machines industry. He began flirting with the idea of a cashless card before the New South Wales Crime Commission handed down its report. The card would require gamblers to pre-load funds before gambling and come with a range of restrictions on how, when and where a person could gamble.

  Even the whiff of such thinking had ClubsNSW and its combative CEO, Josh Landis, beating a path to the minister’s door. Landis was well prepared for his role as a political enforcer for ClubsNSW. A lawyer, he had served his political apprenticeship as a staffer in the New South Wales Labor right, and as we saw in Chapter 7 he studied the strategies of the NRA closely. He was the chief spin doctor for ClubsNSW before earning the top job when Anthony Ball resigned as CEO to take up a key lobbying role for Aristocrat Leisure.46 Landis received a congratulatory message in the federal parliament from a Labor shadow minister, Joel Fitzgibbon, who said that Landis was well known around the corridors of Parliament House and would ‘do an outstanding job’.47 ‘Pugnacious’ was the term the press frequently used to describe Landis’s style.48

  Landis no doubt thought that he had a strong negotiating hand. Since Barry O’Farrell came to power in 2021, the Coalition had agreed to memorandums of understanding with ClubsNSW every four years. The document locked in commitments not to increase gambling taxes and to maintain existing regulatory regimes. Central to these agreements was the retention of the concessional tax rates long given to clubs. Clubs were taxed at half the rate of hotels, a gift that had cost the New South Wales budget an estimated $16 billion since 1998.49 More broadly, critics argued that the very existence of the agreements tied the hands of governments by preventing them from enacting serious poker machine reform.50

  But the ground was shifting. According to an anonymous witness, one of the meetings between Landis and Dominello had the appearance of a pre-fight verbal standoff between two boxers. After what must have been an icy greeting, Landis threatened Dominello that things ‘could get ugly’ if the minister pursued plans to force clubs to do more to lock out problem gamblers. Dominello gave as good as he got, telling Landis, ‘This is happening whether you like it or not. Come after me, I can take it.’51

  The Age reported that ‘gaming industry figures’ threatened that Dominello would be targeted if he continued to pursue pokies reform. It was the same old bullying tactics that had worked so well in the past. Sadly, they continued to work: Dominello’s Liberal Party colleagues lined up with the gambling industry to stymie reform.52 It’s as if the mere mention of a gambling-funded targeted seat campaign set off an alarm in the brains of politicians. As Tim Costello maintained, the Gillard experience of pokies reform had taught the parties an enduring lesson: the gambling industry has a mighty arsenal, which they are capable of unleashing at any time.53

  ClubsNSW takes aim again

  The release of the Bergin Inquiry’s report into the scandal of money laundering at Crown Casino in February 2021 increased the tempo and intensity of the debate about a cashless card in New South Wales. Dominello became convinced that ending the use of cash in the state’s 96 000 poker machines would be effective against money laundering. He proposed to his colleagues the introduction of a compulsory cashless card following a year’s trial at one club. His proposal opened up deep fractures in the senior echelons of the party. Senior minister Rob Stokes made a stinging public attack on the pokies industry, accusing it of entrenching disadvantage and inequality. On the other side of the debate was the transport minister, David Elliott, previously the deputy chief of the AHA. Unsurprisingly, he strenuously opposed the introduction of a cashless card.

  Although Dominello did not know it, his fate was sealed. Premier Dominic Perrottet – who had replaced Gladys Berejiklian in October 2021 following the announcement by the Independent Commission Against Corruption of an investigation into Berejiklian – became worried about the drift towards the tougher pokies policy and its implication for the upcoming election. Perrottet demoted Dominello, stripping him of responsibility for gambling. The demotion sparked The Australian Financial Review to ask: ‘Did the pokie industry just demote the NSW gaming minister?’54

  Of course, the industry encompassed both clubs and pubs, and both were influential political players. Clubs could mobilise the power of membership; hotel owners leveraged the power of money. Alexander Harriet wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald: ‘Millions of dollars in personal wealth is at stake for the hotel barons who control the state’s most profitable pokie pubs if the government pushes through with its proposed gaming reforms.’55 There was a lot at stake. Heavily mortgaged but nonetheless multimillionaire pub owners relied on a cut of the $1.6 billion that pokies delivered annually to their bottom line.56

  At one level it was a strange decision by Perrottet to remove Dominello from the gambling portfolio. The premier had had his own confrontation with the dark side of gambling, which had appeared to steel his resolve to take on the industry. In his previous role as New South Wales treasurer, he had toured a club. ‘It was nine o’clock in the morning,’ he explained. ‘And there were a number of people, just sitting there [on poker machines]. I remember thinking this is not normal. This is not normal and no one talks about it. It’s this kind of hidden scourge on society that we just don’t talk about.’57

  But politics was behind Perrottet’s decision to dump Dominello. After Dominello quit parliament soon after, he told the ABC that he’d been forced out by the gambling industry.58 He detailed the pressure laid on by ClubsNSW: ‘It was just, “No we don’t want it [cashless card]. We will fight you to the death on it.”’ The lobbying was very intense, he said – ‘the most intense I’ve ever seen in 12 years as a minister’. And he was struck by how much ClubsNSW had internalised the power they had exerted over Julia Gillard: ‘We will do to you what we did to Julia Gillard,’ he was told. A campaign of undermining Dominello followed, with officials stalking the corridors of Parliament House and telling any Liberal MP who would listen, ‘We want a new minister. We can’t work with this minister.’59

  Oddly, just as Perrottet had despatched Dominello, he decided to stake his leadership on the cashless card for the upcoming election. Tall and lanky with an outwardly calm demeanour and a polished manner, the premier possessed an unusual mix of human foibles. He was mostly described as a devout Catholic with strong conservative family and social values. Digging a bit deeper, a few normal human vices emerged: Perrottet was ‘no wowser. He drinks and is a self-confessed occasional vaper.’60 But he was also an ideologue, a ‘conservative warrior’ who loved the cut and thrust of political debate.61

  But neither personal values nor moral conscience appear to have been at the forefront of Perrottet’s mind as he belatedly embraced the cashless card. His government was lagging in the polls and needed an issue to grab onto, one that would allow the Liberals to control the election narrative. And with opinion polls indicating 63 per cent support for the cashless card, Perrottet must have sensed he was onto a winner.62 So he decided to poke the beast. He went to the electorate saying that gambling was a ‘major social issue’, especially in the wake of the New South Wales Crime Commission’s report into money laundering in pubs and clubs.63

  Andrew Wilkie thought it was a watershed moment. ‘If we can get deep reform in New South Wales,’ he told the press, ‘then I’m in no doubt that reform will roll out across the whole country.’64

  Nevertheless, Perrottet was under no illusions about the political risk he faced. After he decided to champion the cashless card, one of his colleagues gave him some pointed advice: ‘There are four levels of government … federal, state, local and clubs. And therein lies the problem.’

  The problem was exacerbated, too, when newly minted Labor opposition leader Chris Minns refused to back the introduction of a compulsory cashless card, leading critics to allege that the party remained in the pockets of the pokies industry.65 Bland and quietly spoken, Minns showed his tough side – no doubt developed in his previous career as a New South Wales firefighter – to quietly ignore Unions New South Wales secretary Mark Morey, who came out strongly against ClubsNSW and the gambling industry. ‘We have a rare chance at bipartisanship, which will overwhelm the club lobby’s deceitful tactics of threatening jobs and communities to kill reform,’ Morey said.66 Minns wasn’t moved.

  In familiar tactics, ClubsNSW unleashed a ‘dirty tricks’ campaign to press its case. Selected marginal seats were targeted and the organisation was thought to be behind a contentious ‘push polling’ effort to sway voters. A mysterious ‘robo-call’ campaign was swung into action that used biased questioning asserting that clubs and pubs ‘will be made to spend millions’ on the introduction of cashless gaming technology.67 The automated calls appeared to claim that the proposed changes were opposed by numerous global charities, including World Vision and Oxfam, while asking recipients whether ‘local pubs and clubs [should] be made to spend millions … before this technology has been trialled and assessed’.68

  ClubsNSW also ran an online campaign that claimed the proposed cashless card was ‘reckless and unproven’ and would worsen problem gambling. Posters with messages telling customers to say no to cashless gaming cards went up in ClubsNSW venues with the message that the measure was tantamount to government surveillance. The tactic was to appeal to people’s sense of freedom while distracting them from gambling’s harms. Few needed reminding of the immense grassroots power of ClubsNSW: it represented at least 5.7 million members at more than 1300 clubs across the state.69 ‘ClubsNSW’s reach is extensive, never more so than in the lead-up to an election,’ The Sydney Morning Herald’s Lucy Cormack and Harriet Alexander warned politicians and the public.70

  As the election campaign was unfolding, the legal stoush between Stolz and ClubsNSW was winding its way through the courts system. In the midst of the proceedings, Stolz was diagnosed with inoperable cancer. But ClubsNSW continued its action – apparently it was fine to sue a dying man. However, in 2023 all legal hostilities between Stolz and ClubsNSW came to a halt following the striking of a confidential agreement. It’s hardly surprising this happened, given the toll the action was having on Stolz’s health. By his own account, he had lost his house, many friends and very nearly his marriage – all so that ClubsNSW could score a win at his expense.71 But his confidential settlement raised a broader question: was Stolz gagged? Andrew Wilkie, for one, believed ClubsNSW wanted to muzzle Stolz.72

  Back on the election trail, John Landis overstepped the mark in attempting to take down Perrottet. He claimed the premier was acting on his ‘conservative Catholic gut’ and ignoring the evidence when it came to pokies reform. An obviously offensive claim, it was rightly met with outrage. Landis was sacked, effective immediately, by the organisation’s board. ‘The whole sorry saga smacks of desperation by the clubs lobby,’ commented Channel Nine.73

  Having survived Landis’s attempted assassination of his character, Perrottet faced an even more grave personal accusation. An anonymous source revealed that, as a 21-year-old in 2003, the premier had attended a uniform-themed fancy dress party wearing Nazi regalia. The revelation deeply embarrassed Perrottet, eliciting a confession that he’d lived with the knowledge of his mistake all his life. He apologised profusely. But who had leaked the information to the press?

  It turned out that Perrottet’s offensive behaviour was widely known. ‘Political rivals knew about the costume – and everyone, including the premier’s own staff, had heard the rumour that someone was planning to use it against him.’74 Some claimed it came from inside the Liberal Party, in a calculated attempt to kneecap their own premier.75

  The Perrottet government was soundly beaten at the March 2023 poll. The defeat had the smell of a government at the end of its time. But it may well have been pushed over the edge by the ClubsNSW community campaign. After assuming office, Minns killed off meaningful gambling reform. It was, by now, a predictable story.

  9 THE ONLINE REVOLUTION

  In the litany of tragic individual stories of people damaged or destroyed by the rise of online gambling, ‘Silva’s’ is, sadly, a commonplace one. A client of Relationships Australia, his case highlights the rapaciousness of many of Australia’s online betting companies. A self-employed tradesperson, 40-year-old Silva was living in his mother’s garage because, each week, he spent his entire income on gambling, most of it with online operators.

  Once his money ran out, his online gambling operator would refund him a percentage as a loyalty payment, plus some credits so he could keep gambling until more money came in. After two decades of employment, he had no assets. Silva couldn’t see a way out of his private hell because he couldn’t control his gambling, despite cycling in and out of help programs. On Derby Day, one of the large gambling operators sent him a hamper by courier with four different kinds of alcohol so he could ‘enjoy the day betting at home’.1

  Such predatory behaviour is common to the business model of online gambling companies, and governments have let them get away with it.

  Back in the 1990s when the internet was a new technology, it didn’t look like sports betting would attract a huge following. The uptake only crept along with the use of computers and the internet, and it was banned in some states along with gambling advertising. But this dramatically changed in 2007 with the advent of the first smartphones that could connect to the internet.

  The devices were a technological game changer, a virtual casino in your pocket, and they transformed the way people thought about gambling. Because they were able to place bets wherever a person was, even if they were on the move, smartphones gave rise to leisure gambling – the placing of bets whether you’re at home, at work or on the train or the bus, morning, noon and night. According to Charles Livingstone, ‘The massive growth in sports betting is unrivalled in the history of Australian gambling.’2

  In 2010, only 12.6 per cent of Australians had gambled online, a rate that rose to 30.7 per cent in 2019. But as early as 2012 the impact of smartphones was being noticed. ‘The rise of the smart phone is expected to lead to a big jump in Melbourne Cup betting this year,’ noted ABC News in 2012. ‘Australians already bet hundreds of millions of dollars on the Melbourne Cup, but smart phones make it much easier to have a punt than ever before.’3 In 2022, almost half of Australian adults reported having gambled on sports and/or racing in the past year – and most of those had placed a bet using a smartphone or computer.4

  The take-up of online gambling in Australia was bolstered by several political developments. The 2008 High Court decision outlawing state-based restrictions on access to wagering companies and gambling advertising (see Chapter 7) was a fillip to the emerging industry. So was the lax regulation offered to foreign and Australian-based gambling companies by the Northern Territory, where, as a consequence, most chose to locate. And in Australia, up until mid-2023 credit cards were permitted in online betting, whereas under the Interactive Gambling Act 2001 they were banned from TABs, casinos and racetracks.

  And then came the gambling apps, enhancing the smartphone user’s experience. As most people understand, the primary objective of any app is to prolong user engagement. As one online gambling site explained: ‘What began primarily with online casinos has now expanded into other areas, including sports betting, where apps are becoming essential tools for engaging users and enhancing their experience. Apps are uniquely positioned to keep users engaged for longer periods, creating a higher likelihood of repeat visits.’5 The dopamine effect of gambling was becoming even more intense.

  In the vanguard of the online sports gambling revolution was Sportsbet, owned by entrepreneur Matthew Tripp. Founded in 1993, the company was on the edge of bankruptcy when Tripp swooped on it in 2005 for a paltry $250 000. Tripp was a visionary, even if many would say his vision was a dystopian one. He anticipated the boom in online, phone-based and app-based sports betting. He realised his vison by developing technology to streamline and simplify the betting process. He also created clever marketing techniques and pioneered big sponsorship deals with the AFL. Sportsbet paved the way for a corporate gambling takeover of the Australian public’s sporting tradition.

  ‘Colourful’ best describes Tripp’s background. As the son of legendary bookmaker Alan Tripp, Matthew was born and raised in the gambling industry. Alan ran an SP operation for high-profile clients including Kerry Packer and 1980s Labor prime minister Bob Hawke.6 He was often busted in police crackdowns on SP bookies but stayed in the game anyway.

  Today, it is estimated that there are around 100 bookmakers operating in Australia. Some are on racecourses only; they represent a declining share of the market. Of the remainder, there are four big operators, of which Sportsbet is the largest. Underneath them are a clutch of medium-sized online firms with between 2 per cent and 5 per cent market share each. Below this group is a larger number of small online operators. This last sector is known to be the most predatory in its exploitation of vulnerable gamblers.7

  As the new online gambling revolution emerged, any sporting event was fair game. In a sport-obsessed nation like Australia, fusing gambling, sport and technology into mass-media entertainment was always likely to be popular. Today, sports have effectively ceased to exist in their own right, argues journalist Gideon Haigh. ‘They now exist as a vehicle to bet on,’ he says.8