Page 4688 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 10 November 2009
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Therefore duplications and inconsistencies have been removed from the territory’s statute book by the drafting of this bill.
The most significant area that has been clarified has been the definition of an unlawful game. The government agreed with the commission’s recommendation that there should be an updated general definition in conjunction with modifying provisions. This approach is needed because it is not possible for a general or fundamental description of an unlawful game to capture all of the games that are intended without inadvertently capturing some common non-gambling games.
The bill includes a number of changes to the definition of an unlawful game. The changes are as follows. Firstly, games which are purely of skill are no longer included in the general definition. Secondly, games that offer prizes, but where nothing is staked or risked, are now captured in the general definition. Thirdly, the prohibition extends to the activities of non-participants—for example, side-betting on the hands of the participants in the game. Finally, there is now a capacity to exempt certain games from being unlawful, in addition to the current capacity of declaring some games to be unlawful.
Under the bill, the Gambling and Racing Commission will have the power to declare, through disallowable instruments, that certain games are either unlawful or lawful. This ensures that decisions about individual games can be made in a timely fashion and that they are made by the independent expert body tasked with regulating gambling in the territory. The Legislative Assembly will of course have the opportunity to scrutinise and disallow the commission’s list.
The commission’s power to declare certain games exempt or lawful games provides a mechanism for declaring common non-gambling games which are inadvertently captured by the general description as being exempt from being unlawful. The commission has advised that the sorts of games that would be declared include bridge; chess; games such as those ordinarily found at fairs, fetes, shows or amusement centres; and board games such as Scrabble and Monopoly. The commission’s declaration will be tabled prior to the act commencing. This will ensure that there is no period when it would be unlawful to participate in these activities because they had not been declared an exempt or lawful game.
The commission’s capacity to declare certain games as unlawful provides a mechanism for ensuring that games such as those designed specifically for betting are consistently unlawful where otherwise they may have been captured by the general description in some circumstances. This provides certainty for the operators, players and regulators in relation to particular games.
The commission has advised that the sorts of games that would be declared as unlawful include games such as roulette, blackjack, baccarat and all forms of poker. This means that poker tournaments in clubs and hotels will continue to be unlawful in the territory. While poker tournaments are available in other states, concerns continue to be raised in some of these jurisdictions over gaming integrity issues, claimed increases in problem gambling and increased availability of gambling in the community as a result of these tournaments. The government is particularly mindful
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