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

Mehreen Faruqi

I'm not a betting woman but you can always be confident betting on the two major parties to screw over the people who live in this country. It isn't even a gamble to bet on Labor and the Liberals joining up to pass half-baked weak laws, because this is what the big gambling corporations want them to do. They just say, 'Yes, sir'. Labor collected over $4 million in gambling-related bribes—sorry, I mean 'donations'—between 2020 and 2025.

Anthony Chisholm

I'd ask that Senator Faruqi withdraw that.

Varun Ghosh

Senator Faruqi, there's been a request that you withdraw your reference to bribes. I think that it would be appropriate for you to do that. You corrected it and said something else, so I will ask you to withdraw that, please.

Mehreen Faruqi

I withdraw. Labor collected over $4 million in gambling-related inducements between 2020 and 2025. This legislation makes clear exactly who is pulling the strings.

The late Peta Murphy, in a foreword to her report You win some, you lose _m__ore_, said that she was proud to deliver a unanimous report that says enough is enough. She was explicit when she said:

A phased, comprehensive ban on all gambling advertising on all media, that leaves no room for circumvention, is needed. Partial bans on gambling advertising do not work.

But you guys paid no heed. Since the publication of Peta Murphy's report, Australians have lost over $104 billion to gambling. That's $666 million per week. The social harm that this has caused has devastated people and families.

The Labor and Liberal senators voting for this today should be so ashamed. It seems that you come in here with the determination of harming people and communities. Yesterday, it was the cruel NDIS cuts. Today, it is the gambling industry that you are supporting and propping up. This is the Albanese Labor government's MO: do just enough to get a headline, but don't actually fix the real issue, and definitely do not risk upsetting whichever corporations and their bigwigs that are paying politicians so they can keep ripping people off.

It's not oversimplifying to say that this is all just about political donations. In this case, it couldn't be clearer. Four in five Australians support a total ban on gambling advertisements, including on TV, radio and online. A total gambling ad ban is an overwhelmingly popular policy. But what does this bill do? It is nowhere near it. The only winners today are the big gambling companies preying on the vulnerable and raking in profit after profit.

One of the core focuses of this so-called reform has been on inducements, or what the gambling industry likes to sanitise through the term 'generosities'. This was yet another crystal clear recommendation of the Murphy report: ban inducements. Yet the draft bill we got from Prime Minister Albanese didn't even touch on them. Now, pushed in the Senate inquiry to do something, the Prime Minister and Angus Taylor have cut a deal to put their gambling company donors in charge of who is or isn't able to access inducements. What an utter disgrace!

Recent data from the Australian Gambling Research Centre showed that around three million people are engaged in some form of harmful gambling. Many of these people have told their devastating stories over and over, but the government has turned the other cheek and somehow still feels comfortable getting up and pretending that this is reform and that this will stop harm. Well, it won't. It won't stop harm. This is just another Labor and Liberal stitch-up that will continue to see gambling decimate families and decimate communities. Gambling companies are the winners once again, just like the gas companies are the winners of the failure to impose a gas export tax and just like the war machine is the winner of the failing AUKUS deal.

Time and time again, this Labor government proves that it is completely bought out by vested interests. The days of a Labor Party that stands up for the workers are long gone. What is left is a party bereft of courage and full of cowardice. They have shown that again today, and they showed it yesterday. We see right through you. People see right through you. You are fooling no-one, and you will be held to account for these terrible decisions. The Greens will be moving amendments to give teeth to this legislation, and I want to foreshadow two amendments to the bill that I will be moving. They will remove the gambling reform exemptions from horse racing, harness racing and greyhound racing. It hasn't been talked about much, but it is a very important amendment.

After decades of excusing horse and greyhound deaths, all in the name of so-called sport, the Labor government now wants to say that horse racing and greyhound racing are not sports for the purposes of gambling. Which is it? Are you finally admitting that this horrific cruelty is no sport at all? There are no lines the Albanese government won't cross. There is no hypocrisy it won't engage in if it fills their election war chest. In the inquiry hearing, even Racing Australia CEO Paul Eriksson admitted that, without wagering, there is no racing industry. This is because horse and greyhound racing lost their social licence years ago.

Ordinary people don't want to watch horses and dogs be run to their deaths. Go to a greyhound racing meet, and the stands will be empty. But the racing industry says: 'No worries. Under Labor, Liberals and One Nation, we will always be able to rely on robbing the public of their hard earned money. We can continue to cover their screens in ads encouraging gambling, and we will always be able to prey on people's suffering.' The exemption for animal racing is purely to sustain what would otherwise be a dead and buried industry—buried in the ground alongside the gorgeous animals that they have forced to race.

This bill does not protect Australians from gambling harm. It gives a green light for wagering companies to go all-in on funnelling their marketing budgets into horse and greyhound racing, but the irony doesn't stop there. The Albanese government says that, if you are a dedicated racing channel or program, you're not constrained by any of these weak reforms either. Effectively, you are saying gambling advertising must be constrained somewhat because of the harm it causes—that is, unless your whole business is dedicated to increasing gambling. Make it make sense. Minister, my question to you is: why the hell have you brought this piss-weak bill into parliament?

Varun Ghosh

Minister, I'm going to call you in a moment. Senator Faruqi, I note that some of that phrasing is going right up to the line of what would be parliamentary. I'm giving you an indication of that.

Anthony Chisholm

Thanks, Senator Faruqi, for the question. This is the most substantial and strongest ever action that any government has taken in terms of gambling reform. You can tut-tut all you want, but it's actually the reality of what we are dealing with in terms of this legislation. You did make mention of the Murphy report, which is obviously a substantial bit of work that has gone into influencing the government's decision on this. I am someone who has the highest regard for the late Peta Murphy and the work that she did, and that has been important in terms of influencing government on the decisions that we've taken.

This is part of an extensive consultation where we've listened to a range of views to land the balanced approach that we have in this legislation. Whilst we've heard for a long time that many Australians enjoy having a bet and that it's part of their social life, for others it becomes a trap that they can't escape. That's something that we're dealing with in terms of this legislation.

We understand that there are strongly held views about this issue in the parliament and also around the country, but we believe that this legislation gets the balance right. It implements reform that protects people from gambling harm. It also protects children from overexposure to gambling ads. We think that that gets the right balance for this parliament to be supportive of.

Varun Ghosh

Before I call the next question, I need to note that, with the concurrence of the Senate, the statements of reasons accompanying the requests circulated for this bill will be incorporated in Hansard immediately after the requests to which they relate. There being no objection to that, it is so ordered.

Long debate text truncated.