Reducing the harm from pokies

Host responsibility policies for pokie venues should be fully detailed in the Gambling (Harm Prevention and Minimisation) Regulations 2004. That means it will be easier to prosecute a venue for breaches of the policy.

The policy should include a requirement for:

• Venue staff to monitor the gambling area and be trained to recognise signs of gambling harm.
• Venue staff to approach pokie players who have been gambling for two hours and encourage them to take breaks.
• Venue staff to record any harm-related events or signs of harm
• The display of gambling harm minimisation messages (e.g. brochures and posters). There should also be information on how to get free and confidential help and support for a gambling problem from a counselling service and this should be clearly displayed in the gambling area (not behind the bar).

Venues should be required to be trained in host responsibility by an external training provider and not the Class 4 trusts and societies (who own the pokie machines). This could be done by Te Hiringa Hauora/Health Promotion Agency or by one of the services that provide support to people experiencing harm from gambling.

There needs to be regular auditing and inspection (e.g. minimum of every six months) of venues to ensure that host responsibility standards are being met. This may include ‘mystery shopper’ visits, particularly to venues of high risk (i.e. venues with high losses on pokies and located in medium-high to very high deprivation areas).

The gambling environment in venues should be changed. For instance, why are the pokies in dimly lit rooms with no clocks?

Pokie machines are specifically designed to be addictive because they give players unrealistic impressions of the odds of winning, confuse people about how much money they have lost, and encourage sustained periods of gambling – often in the hope of recovering losses. They play on two key neurochemical drivers of behaviour: adrenaline and dopamine.

To reduce harm from pokie machines, PGF suggests the use of some machine features that can reduce harm for the player such as:

• Regularly interrupting continuous playing.

• Displaying more information, such as harm minimisation messaging, return to player ratio of games, and volatility of games.
• Having a maximum number of games that can be played in an hour.

• Mandatory pre-commitment technology on all pokie machines so that players can set the amount of money or time they intend to spend prior to gambling.
• Multi-row bets being prevented or limited.
• Maximum stakes reduced.
• Review of jackpot size, messaging on gaming machines, and signage.
• Requiring Class 4 Trusts and Societies (who own the pokie machines) to provide facial recognition technology on the machines to identify excluded gamblers.

The penalties for breaches of host responsibility just aren’t tough enough. It also relies on somebody going into a venue to do an inspection and there are 1,050 venues across NZ. The resource is not available and this makes enforcement weak. There is no deterrent to venues when there are light penalties and poor enforcement.

Further there is a grey area of responsibility in Class 4 regulation between the DIA and the Gambling Commission. This needs to be tightened up so venues know they cannot by-pass the regulator.

PGF suggests that:

• This review clearly outlines which organisation – whether the DIA or Gambling Commission – holds the responsibility for monitoring, ensuring compliance, and enforcement of penalties. We strongly urge the DIA and Gambling Commission to discuss the new changes so that this is clearly understood between both organisations. It is important that enforcement criteria are agreed upon to ensure effective and stronger compliance.
• While existing penalties cannot be increased in this review, the suggested infringement fees (fees that are charged if a venue breaches host responsibility regulations) for each of the existing and potential options are inadequate. Stronger infringement fees are required to ensure harm minimisation regulations are observed. We submit that infringement fees are increased to those of breaches to the Sale and Supply of Alcohol Act 2012 as these have been effective in enforcing regulations around alcohol. Class 4 Trusts, Societies, and venue staff will also be familiar with the Sale and Supply of Alcohol Act 2012 and will encourage them to seriously consider the importance of gambling harm minimisation.