Reporting Gambling

In May, the Council hosted a public forum in Melbourne to discuss the media's treatment of gambling issues. Deborah Kirkman gives the low down on what was said.

Terry McCrann, Associate Editor with the Herald Sun, who chaired the meeting, opened it by posing the question, "Are we in the media hostage to the gambling interests?".

Arguing that "it would be hard to know even when you have been bought", the Rev Tim Costello, Director of the Urban Mission Unit at the Collins Street Baptist Church, noted an editorial which stated: "Embittered gamblers who frittered away their money cannot expect sympathy ... The choice is ours whether or not to gamble." Commenting on the fact that the Melbourne Crown Casino spends $20 million a year on advertising, he believes that "when there is this much money involved there will be a very uniform view put out."

Prof Robert Goodman, Professor at Hampshire College and Executive Director of the US Gambling Research Institute, asked, "Why did we suddenly discover the gambling industry as this great source of new revenue as a way to create jobs?" In answer to his own question; because "gambling brings in billions of dollars. Politicians, and research reports done by the gambling industry, will predict to the dollar what the income side of the equation will be. They'll predict how many workers you will hire in the casinos. Governments, both in the US and Australia, rushed in to expand gambling as a panacea for unemployment." But what of the role of the press?

Prof Jan McMillen, Professor of Gaming at the University of Western Sydney Macarthur, and Executive Director of the Australian Institute of Gambling Research, believes "the press play a key strategic, politically important role in setting the agenda on gambling policy." While praising the business press, she criticised the press generally because "it fails the public by not giving it a voice." A view also expressed by Prof Goodman, "Very rarely do you see any organised community voice, the bulk of the population is not sought out by the press ... there was not a single group in the entire United States, not funded by the gambling industry, that was asking for more gambling."

Opposition in Australia has been forthcoming by religious groups, yet in the early '90s, according to Rev Costello, "There were some mentions of our concerns but always near the end of articles, and the comments were about us rather than by us." He referred to a 1996 article in The Age asking why is was that Melburnians had taken to the casino in such unprecedented numbers, given the strength of opposition to the casino and to the growth of gaming in Victoria. Rev Costello explained that he did not come out and say it is a sin. "The churches deliberately argued in terms of the social consequences." However, Prof McMillen commented that there "is still a fairly simplistic tendency to structure the debate in terms of sinners and saviours."

And what of the social consequences of gambling? The costs.

Rev Costello praised a "brilliant piece" in The Age which picked up that there was a shift in culture. As he put it, "As you expand gambling you will continue to expand the number of problem gamblers, and what's more you will actually shift the nature of hope." And hope is eternal for problem gamblers, a group which Prof McMillen believes has emerged only in the last five years as a recognisable, identifiable and debated policy issue. Prof Goodman informed the meeting of the economic harm occasioned by problem gamblers in the United States: $150 billion a year in California, to give one example. "Communities in the US which have casinos have a much higher suicide and bankruptcy rates than communities that don't."

Yet, the quick fix is a strong impulse. Rev Costello explained that when he represents poor kids at the Melbourne Children's Court and hears Magistrates say to kids, "Don't take short-cuts, don't try and get something for nothing", right opposite the Children's Court is two city blocks of this entertainment palace called Crown Casino, built on the values that say "Take a short cut, try and get something for nothing. As for the press, Prof McMillen's last words were ones of encouragement: "I urge you to be a bit more courageous than you have been in the past, broaden your vision, sharpen your pencils and get out there and start stirring the pot."

[For more on reporting gambling issues, see also Gambler Admits Theft Lie]

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