While it was a blow to the Premier’s chances, the issue of gaming as a reflection of integrity will continue to hound his opponent, Labor’s Chris Minns.
Unless you’re performing a salute to ’Allo ’Allo! at the local repertory I can’t see how there are many laughs to be had in donning the Nazi kit. Worse is that the news has come while the Perrottet government contemplates draft legislation that would criminalise the display of Nazi paraphernalia.
Ultimately, the people of NSW will make their own judgments. Suffice to say, the Australian Jewish Association handled Perrottet’s confession with good grace.
The President of the AJA, David Adler, issued a statement on Thursday where he said, “Young people sometimes do stupid, occasionally offensive things.
“The Jewish tradition teaches us the concept of Teshuva, a genuine repentance which earns forgiveness.
“The Premier has always been a strong friend of the Jewish community and Israel. We accept the Premier’s apology and regard this incident as of no relevance to the present.”
Bravo!
There has to be a rubbery statute of limitations around the foolhardiness of youth, otherwise the family photo albums of any aspiring politician might count them out of the game.
I’d suggest Perrottet self-reporting as a man who has donned the brown shirt or, worse, the black tunic, is less alarming than the fact that the threat of the release of photographs of Perrottet giving it the old “Heil Hitler” at his 21st came from within his own party room. A house divided and all that.
It is entirely possible that another group heard the news with a strong sense of schadenfreude. Clubs NSW, one of the most powerful lobby groups in the state, has been agitating against the Premier over his support for the introduction of a gaming card with pre-set limits for poker machine punters.
Gambling is the best thing a person can do, provided they are good at it. I’ve never met anyone who has turned a regular dollar from Electronic Gaming Machines (EGMs). Unless a punter has been lucky to win a huge jackpot, they’ll always be chasing their tail.
As we have come to expect, the Greens want to ban pokies in pubs and clubs in NSW. The Green-Left position is always to ban things they don’t like. If they turned that philosophy to funnel web spiders, I’d be all for it. But in social policy it makes no sense. As I understand their policy framework, crystal meth should be legal, possibly knocked out at servos, while sitting on a comfy chair and pressing a few buttons is not, which is an interesting take on harm minimisation.
In the unlikely event the Greens form government, smoking a dart while having a lash, would be an anti-social quinella of jailable proportions.
Back in the real world, the Liberal Party under Gauleiter Perrottet supports the introduction of the gaming card, the Nationals do not, and Chris Minns is having five bob each way.
Minns proposes the continuance of pilot programs of the prepaid cards while workshopping a few other responses to the issue of problem gambling. In other words, NSW Labor’s position is more no with a but than yes with an if.
To muddy the waters further, Unions NSW supports the Perrottet position while some other unions who own licenced clubs with poker machines do not. It is stating the bleeding obvious that Clubs NSW and the Australian Hotels Association are major donors to both parties. Similarly, Labor’s cosiness with the gaming industry is well known and if nothing else, amounts to a retirement plan for life after politics for Labor MPs who wander out of the confines of Macquarie Street.
The question is, will a prepaid gaming card make a difference? Tasmania has brought a similar card in, but it is too early to say if it has done any measurable good. What is proposed in NSW is a punter with an itch can restrict his or her losses to a self-imposed limit of no more than $1500 a day. It could be less, but it can’t be more.
Now a gorilla and a half does sound rather a lot to be dumping into a machine before the machine switches off and security escorts the punter from the gaming area. The psychology of it is that punters are more rational about what they can afford to lose before they take their seats, and the blinking lights take hold.
The view is that the pokies are unique in terms of gaming. If you want to bet on a horse race and lose, you’ve got at least five minutes to ponder a life of poverty before another race comes along. In sports betting it might be a day or even a week before the bailiffs come knocking on the door. Meanwhile, the pokies are omnipresent, and one’s losses are not properly appreciated until it is too late.
For those who love their data crisp and meaningful, we have an inbuilt control on problem gambling in this country. Western Australia does not have pokies in its clubs and pubs with the exception of the Crown Casino in Perth, whereas in other states and territories, pokies are ubiquitous.
Problem gambling is determined by self-identification which can skew results but by this method in Western Australia, problem gamblers account for 0.5 per cent of the adult population. In NSW where pokies proliferate, it is 3.5 per cent.
There are no other immediately obvious factors which would account for the difference and no other conclusion to reach other than the majority of NSW’s self-reporting problem gamblers are hooked on poker machines.
The NSW Crime Commission’s report ominously entitled Project Islington – An Inquiry into Money Laundering via EGMs in Licensed Pubs and Clubs exposed money laundering from the proceeds of crime. As much as $95 billion flows through EGMs in NSW every year. How much of it is black money, the commission could not say but they pulled in a few crooks and gave them the third degree to try and figure it out.
I’m sure money is laundered through the pokies but as it stands, it’s a fairly labour-intensive exercise. Washing millions in drug money at under $10,000 a go (the ceiling for which cash can still be used as a means of exchange and/or Austrac starts to take notice) in front of a poker machine is time and money poorly spent when there are tax havens around the world who can do the job a lot quicker.
The commission made no recommendations around harm minimisation for problem gamblers because that is not part of its bailiwick. Neither it seems are privacy concerns because everyone who would punt on a poker machine when the card is introduced is coughing up a hell of a lot of personal data into uncertain and possibly hackable bases.
Voters will decide the fate of Perrottet and Minns on March 25 this year. The prepaid gaming card is and will continue to be a major issue in defining the integrity of the Premier and the man who wants to take his place while the brouhaha over Nazi costumery will be fish and chip wrapper sometime next week.
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The NSW state election is coming and who might win is an even money bet. There may have been a blowout in the odds on Premier Dom Perrottet’s election after his grim-faced confession of youthful Nazi cosplay.