Bill cracking down on online gambling could make losses seem more real

The sports events of this week have finally kicked off, but surprisingly, on the official website of the Australian Football League (AFL), the odds for each team are prominently displayed in the middle of the schedule, along with betting links. The same situation appears on the websites of the National Rugby League (NRL) and the National Basketball League (NBL), while only McDonald's advertisements are found on the A-League's website.

Two years ago, a bipartisan parliamentary committee, chaired by the late Labor MP Peta Murphy and vice-chaired by National Party MP Pat Conaghan, recommended banning all online sports betting advertisements within three years. However, this recommendation ultimately failed to materialize, with the power of money seemingly prevailing.

However, when Parliament reconvenes in three weeks (unless an early election is called), Rebekha Sharkie, the independent MP for the Mayo electorate, will introduce a private member's bill, attempting a different approach. This bill would require online gambling companies to display a customer's current winnings and losses, as well as their cumulative losses, each time they log in.

This idea originated from a two-page proposal submitted to the parliamentary inquiry chaired by Murphy in 2023 by Jack Minear, a Western Australian businessman. Minear, who primarily sells mobile phone accessories, is deeply concerned about the problem of online gambling. In a key paragraph of his proposal, he wrote: "My strong recommendation is that all online gambling applications, such as Sportsbet, CrownBet, Ladbrokes, and bet365, should be compelled to continuously display the user's financial position on the main screen, just like a bank account balance."

Online gambling entered Australia in 1996 when Centrebet went online. Two years prior, a company called Microgaming, based in the Isle of Man, developed the software that enabled online gambling. In hindsight, this event may be similar to the arrival of red fire ants in 2001 or the COVID-19 virus in 2020. We have strict quarantine and border controls to prevent pests and diseases from entering Australia, but we allowed online gambling to enter without careful consideration and discussion, and only regulated it in 2001, and even then, the regulation was minimal. Now, people lose approximately AUD 32 billion annually through online gambling, with the majority of those losses coming from those who can least afford it.

Murphy wrote in the foreword to the committee's report that online gambling "is causing havoc in our communities." She added: "I am proud to say that this committee has presented a unanimous report saying 'enough is enough'." However, it has become clear that "enough" is far from enough. Since Murphy released her resounding report in 2023 and her unfortunate passing later that year, the recommendation to ban advertising has not been implemented, while online gambling has only grown stronger. The proportion of the population engaging in high-risk gambling has increased, and PointsBet's share price has tripled.

It is said that 80% of the Australian adult population participates in gambling, the highest proportion in the world. The total gambling turnover for the 2022-23 financial year (the latest statistical year) was AUD 244.3 billion, significantly exacerbating the cost of living crisis. Minear's idea was not mentioned in Murphy's foreword, nor in the committee's report or, more importantly, its 31 recommendations.

But Minear is not the kind of person to give up easily. Sharkie read my articles, and later another article, and contacted him, hoping to put his idea into practice. Together, they have proposed the "Interactive Gambling Amendment (Know Your Losses Activity Statement) Bill 2025," which is supported by another independent MP, Andrew Wilkie, the MP for the Division of Clark. The bill was submitted to Parliament a few weeks ago and is scheduled for a vote at the next sitting commencing on March 25.

The bill would require the "constant" prominent display of information on the application or website, including "information about the individual's total net losses and gains at a particular time, for each of the following periods: (a) the most recent calendar month; (b) the most recent calendar year; (c) from the commencement of this subsection to the particular time." Minear had hoped that (c) would be calculated from the person's first time gambling, but this would make the bill retrospective and therefore too difficult, so he accepted that it would be calculated permanently from the date the bill comes into effect.

Over time, this will become a longer period, eventually showing most gamblers how much they have lost since they started gambling on the service. As Minear says, it's like a bank showing you your account balance when you log in to online banking; not showing it leaves you unaware of how much you can spend. Most people may not remember how much they have lost, focusing only on the rare wins, but providing some transparency may make them think twice. At the very least, they will continue to gamble knowing how much they have already lost, and with a clear awareness that they will likely lose this time too.

Sharkie's bill is not a complete solution to the problem of online gambling in itself—advertising should also be banned, as recommended by the Murphy committee, and the AFL, NRL, and NBL should not include odds in their schedules. The current practice of quickly displaying information such as "Think! What are you really gambling with?" and "You win some. You lose more" (which is the title of the Murphy committee's 2023 report) after television gambling advertisements is worth trying and should be retained, but they are not effective on their own.

Online gambling is the fourth plague to infect Australian sport. The first was tobacco, which was removed from sport in the 70s; the second was alcohol, which is restricted but not banned; the third was fast food; and online gambling is the fourth. Of course, they all still exist and will never be completely eradicated. In fact, tobacco, or rather, tobacco excise, seems to be causing a plague of illegal cigarettes and gang warfare.

But if Jack Minear and Rebekha Sharkie's bill is passed, at least those affected by the fourth plague will know what they are doing.