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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 06 Hansard (Thursday, 24 June 2004) . . Page.. 2687 ..

the monitoring of poker machines, went to a centralised system. For a huge state with about 6,000 clubs, there might be some logic in that. We have, I think, 64 clubs. The information that the commission receives is received within three or four weeks.

It has been pointed out that this monitoring is something that the clubs would have to pay for and would cost them about $360 a machine per year. In the case of medium clubs, the impost would be quite significant at about $50,000. For larger ones, it would be hundreds of thousand of dollars, to do something that is really being done at present. We would certainly want to see a proper cost-benefit analysis done just to see whether there is any real need for this monitoring.

I note that in recent discussions the government has indicated that it does not intend to do too much about this matter. It has in clause 67 regulation making powers to provide for the establishment and operation of the CMS and may fix a date for that in future, but the government has no intention of doing anything at this point. It may well be that it will be desirable for work to be done down the track, but I think it is bad law as much as anything to have these provisions on the books if nothing is going to happen in the foreseeable future. If something is going to happen in the foreseeable future, the government can simply bring an amendment to the Assembly at the time and have it passed.

At this stage, these two clauses serve no real purpose. I suspect that there would be significant problems with them if they were actioned immediately, which is not going to be the case. I think that the most sensible thing to do is to delete them by opposing them. If the government does show down the track any need to have such a system, a small bill could be prepared and the monitoring could happen then.

MRS CROSS (5.53): I shall be opposing clauses 66 and 67, as I believe that the introduction of a central monitoring system would be overly costly and unnecessary. This project would be a costly one that would undoubtedly hurt many clubs, particularly small and medium sized clubs, as the costs would be passed on to them. Further, it is my understanding that, even though this system is being placed into legislation, it will not be implemented. I shall therefore not be supporting attempts by the government to introduce this system.

MR QUINLAN (Treasurer, Minister for Economic Development, Business and Tourism, and Minister for Sport, Racing and Gaming) (5.53): The central monitoring system will be implemented if it is cost effective. We have had an amount of protestation from the club industry. We have certainly had some strong lobbying and I am prepared to listen to that and take note of it, but it is strange that the clubs that have come to us and said that they could not do it because it would be prohibitive can somehow run link jackpots without a problem, and with great alacrity. I think that these provisions should stay in the act on the basis that, provided it is not going to be an inordinate impost upon clubs and provided the case stands up, there will be a central monitoring system.

Clause 66 agreed to

Clause 67.

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