AUDITORS have been called in to assess the role of Victoria's
gambling watchdog in the lead-up to an overhaul of pokies licences and amid
criticism that it lacks any real independence or power.
Prominent gambling opponent Tim Costello has criticised the
Victorian Commission for Gambling Regulation's powers after The Age
revealed yesterday the regulator was ordered to assess the impact of a
massive increase in Crown Casino's gambling capacity months after Crown's deal
with the State Government was done.
The deal has sparked debate over the dangers of table games,
such as poker and blackjack, after Premier John Brumby disputed their link to
problem gambling.
The Government has been forced to seek the assessment from the
gambling watchdog to push the deal through Parliament.
Mr Costello said the deal showed the commission had ''no power
to investigate virtually the doubling of Crown and have now been called in
because there is a political problem''.
Executive commissioner Peter Cohen said the regulator had
contracted auditors KPMG to review the organisation to ensure it could cope with
substantial changes to the poker machine industry after 2012.
The KPMG review has been going for about five weeks and is due
to be completed by November.
The changes will end the duopoly of Tatts Group and Tabcorp by
allowing pubs and clubs to own machine licences.
Defending the ''tax-for-tables deal'' yesterday, Mr Brumby said
problem gambling was rarely if ever linked to tables and that gaming machines
were the real problem.
''If you look at all of the reports that have been done over
the years, the Productivity Commission, university reports, there is little, if
any, linkage between table games and problem gambling,'' he said.
But his comments sparked outrage among problem gambling
experts.
''I nearly fell off my chair,'' said Charles Livingstone, of
Monash University's health social science department. ''It's the most
extraordinary statement I've ever heard someone say.''
Dr Livingstone said 85 per cent of problem gamblers in Victoria
were addicted to poker machines but that figure was partly due to their
availability in the suburbs. In some overseas areas, 50 per cent of table game
players were addicts, he said.
''There's no doubt table games are strongly associated with
problem gambling.''
Opposition Leader Ted Baillieu said the Premier's comment was
''dangerously ignorant,'' but he did not necessarily oppose more gaming tables
at Crown.
Dr Livingstone said he could not understand the favourable
treatment given by successive state governments to James Packer's casino.
Mr Packer wrote to Mr Brumby shortly before the deal was
struck, expressing frustration with negotiations and threatening ''far-reaching
ramifications''.
Gaming Minister Tony Robinson said he would make the
commission's assessment public and yesterday offered the public two weeks to
comment on the deal that was negotiated in April.
