Interactive Gambling Amendment (Gambling Reform) Bill 2026, National Self-exclusion Register (Cost Recovery Levy) Amendment Bill 2026

Dr WEBSTER (Mallee) (10:59): First of all, I want to say that there are some subjects in the House that have bipartisan support. We all want to see the harm from gambling reduced. How that is done and what is implemented may or may not actually end up with that outcome.

This is about outcomes. It should never be about the headline. The coalition, in good faith, has been working with the current government to ensure that we get the best bill forward.

As a social worker in my past life, I can never leave behind the impacts from things like gambling and other harms, other addictions, and how they impact families and homelessness. Gambling is a very serious issue. There are plenty of people in Australia who enjoy a punt, so I'm told.

I personally don't go down that track myself, but there are plenty of people who do without causing them to lose their home or put their families in dire straits where there is no food on the table. But we must take those risks very, very seriously, and we do. Mallee residents have contacted me about gambling harm because it is impacting their families.

The central question is not whether gambling harm exists but whether the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Gambling Reform) Bill 2026 as it currently stands will effectively reduce that harm. I want to, as has occurred already in this first hour of debate, acknowledge the contribution of the late Peta Murphy, the prior member for Dunkley, and her incredible commitment to ensuring that gambling is dealt with in a serious and responsible manner by the government.

The Murphy inquiry highlighted concerns about gambling harm, gambling advertising, impacts on children, consumer protections and illegal offshore gambling. Parliament owes it to every Australian to carefully consider those concerns. Parliament's responsibility is not merely to identify a problem—almost anyone can do that—but to implement solutions that actually work.

Gambling is no longer confined to pubs and the tabs. That's a fact. It's embedded in sport, phones, online streaming services, free-to-air TV, social media and sporting commentary.

Children are discussing 'odds on' and 'odds off' while watching a football game. Why are Australian children learning the language of betting before they learn financial literacy? It's a really good question.

The connection between sport and gambling has become culturally normalised, and we need to stop it. I firstly want to acknowledge the positive elements that are in this bill. The advertising reforms that are put forward—restrictions around live sport, radio restrictions during school pick-up and drop-off, bans on athlete and celebrity endorsements, removal of gambling advertising from player uniforms and sporting venues, consumer protections, strengthening BetStop, and further action against illegal operators.

The last thing we want to see, just like with vapes and the tobacco industry, is for illegal operators to take up this space. We also want to see a ban on online keno, the pocket pokies, and prohibition of foreign matched lotteries. There are elements of this bill that deserve support, but important concerns remain.

In 2018 live sport gambling-advertising restrictions, the coalition showed that acting on gambling harm when practical reforms were needed worked. We introduced restrictions during live sport across free-to-air TV, radio, subscription TV and online streaming. What this bill gets wrong, however, is that, potentially, it may water down the gains from those reforms—for instance, when the coalition legislated restrictions during live sport or breaks in play or, importantly in the context of this, bill during children's programs from five am to 8.30 pm.

This bill was simply set quotas of three ads per hour between six am and 8.30 pm, including during live sports. The restrictions during children's programming seem to disappear. Importantly, if there is an unscheduled break in play—for instance, when a goal is scored—arguably, gambling ads will be permitted at those times.

Coalition reforms also strengthened enforcement under the Interactive Gambling Act. Since then, more than 1,700 illegal gambling and affiliate websites have been blocked. More than 230 illegal operators have left the Australian market.

Under the coalition in 2018, we introduced the National Consumer Protection Framework for Online Wagering, with No. 4 of the 10 reforms in that framework being on inducement, like bonus bets, sign-up bonuses, vouchers, credits, rewards, referral bonuses and the like. Those anti-inducement measures were introduced nationally in 2019 when the coalition was in government.

In a moment, I'll also talk about how those inducement measures need to be strengthened, seven years from when the framework was implemented. The foundations for BetStop and harm-minimisation measures have been bipartisan to reduce gambling harm. Coalition governments already established important foundations legislating the architecture for the likes of national self-exclusion register, BetStop, which launched in August 2023.

BetStop, at last check, had over 30,000 registered users with about 23,000 exclusions active. I want to point out that that also involves people's choice and people's agency to make the choice to recognise that they have a problem and sign up to BetStop. We encourage and implore more and more Australians to do exactly that.

On the current bill, let's be clear that most viewing of what we once called television—now streaming—content is via logged-in users who are over 18 and able to opt out of gambling advertising. The coalition view is that we can move from opt out to opt in. Gambling advertising should only be received if an adult actively chooses to receive it.

The merits of opt in are that it protects children and vulnerable Australians by default. It places responsibility on advertisers rather than consumers. It aligns with modern consent principles.

It preserves adult choice. It's a middle ground between doing nothing and a complete ban. The practical challenges, of course, are age verification, privacy concerns, cross-platform implementation, smart TVs and connected devices, and offshore operators outside Australian jurisdiction.

Australians should not have to spend their lives opting out of gambling advertising. The default setting should be protection. Predatory inducements and duty of care have been raised in evidence to the Senate, in VIP programs, bonus bets and targeted inducements.

We've seen quite a bit of that in the papers in this last week. What responsibility do operators owe customers who are exhibiting signs of addiction and harm? There is a duty of care to support consideration of a statutory duty of care.

Identifying vulnerability, intervening early, reducing harm and acting before crisis occurs—harm reduction is not simply about advertisements; it's also about industry responsibility. Offshore gambling, of course, remains the next big challenge. I want to acknowledge our support, on this side, and the work of ACMA—there have been 1,751 offshore sites blocked and 230-plus operators exited, as I said earlier.

Many operators sit outside Australian jurisdiction. Examples cited in recent enforcement actions include operators associated with Curacao, the Union of Comoros, Costa Rica and Ireland. Enforcement is difficult.

Websites change domains, mirror sites emerge, cryptocurrency can bypass traditional controls, and operators are internationally dispersed. With regard to the pocket pokies—online keno—they illustrate the movement of casino-style gambling products onto smartphones. Foreign matched lotteries are an example of gambling products entering Australia from outside the traditional regulatory framework, and then, of course, there are the illegal offshore operators, which require stronger enforcement tools and international cooperation.

Neil from my electorate says he agrees fully with me about offshore gaming sites. He says: we should also be legislating to protect our children (and adults!!) from overseas gambling sites, or they will become the norm!! Parliament can regulate Australian broadcasters and Australian bookmakers.

It is much harder to regulate offshore operators. Reform should reduce harm, not simply push Australians into less regulated offshore markets. I was pretty horrified, I have to say, to visit an RSL in my electorate and to see a 19-year-old, at nine o'clock in the morning, with his work shirt on, playing the pokies.

He was clearly meant to be at work, but he was in there, at 19 years of age. To see that in front of your face is incredibly confronting. I know this bill doesn't go to that, but it goes point to gambling addiction and the harms that are for life if you can't get out of it.

It's not abstract; it's about real people in every one of our electorates. In conclusion, there are three overarching principles: adults should remain free to make lawful choices, children deserve stronger protection, and gambling providers should bear greater responsibility for reducing harm. The test of this legislation is not whether parliament passes it.

The test is whether fewer Australian experience gambling harm in the future, whether fewer children grow up associating sport with betting, whether fewer vulnerable people are targeted with inducements and whether fewer Australians are drawn into the unregulated offshore gambling space.