CLIMATE
-Net zero fossil fuel emissions by 2030
Policy: Cut fossil fuel emissions, to net zero (on 2005 levels) by 2030.
Reason: I am proposing this policy in line with the group, Vote Climate One, to highlight in the strongest possible way that we are not just experiencing climate change but we are facing the sixth extinction. We can no longer try to save the whole economy AND save ourselves. It is too late for that and those in the environment industry, including the UN Conference of Parties (COP), of which I’ve been a delegate, know that. We must try to save life-on-earth as the priority. The UNFCCC which runs the COP has been calling for countries to show ambition for years. This policy does that and alerts the community that we do not have any more time to waste. I issued two media releases from the EPA is the 1990s about the risks of greenhouse gas. Government has known about this and had time to transition industry to renewables and workers to other jobs for three decades.
Result: Help concentrate the minds on the catastrophic situation we face and show the ambition the UNFCC is crying out for. Help restore Australia’s role as one of the group of Developed Nations in the international climate regime which is obligated under the Paris Agreement to show ambition.
- Electric vehicles (EVs) for all Victorian car drivers
Policy: Rapidly cut transport emissions (17% of all emissions) by half by replacing fossil-fuelled cars with EVs by using the $125B allocated for the Suburban Rail Link to subsidise the purchase of an EV for the 5M plus Victorian car drivers. The balance be tax deductible and other incentives such as free-parking be considered.
Reason: Rapidly cut transport emissions from cars and show the ambition that is being called for by the UN. Most Victorians cannot afford an EV in the near future without government support.
Result: Rapid reduction of Victorian emissions by 8.5%. Help meet Australia’s target of 50% EVs by 2030.
- Plans for targets
Policy: That all climate related targets have plans with dates and are annually audited by independent auditors.
Reason: In order to meet targets, they need to have clear plans or they are at risk of being missed. We cannot afford now to miss anymore targets. The UNFCCC which runs the CoPs has shown its lack of confidence in Australia’s emissions measurements in a study of 10 countries presented to the 2019 CoP. Victoria needs to show the way with clear plans and transparent measurements.
Result: Victoria meets its targets and shows the ambition the UN is calling for. Climate change has a chance of being curtailed more than it otherwise would.
- Cease fossil fuel production
Policy: Victoria’s three remaining coal stations to close by 2030.
Reason: Burning fossil fuels to produce electricity, contributes 33.6 per cent of the total greenhouse gas emissions.
-Transition coal workers
Policy: Start transitioning coal workers now to alternative employment. (0.3% of Australia’s population was employed in mining in 2016 (ABS))
reason: It is in line with climate justice to help transition workers to alternative employment. Government has know about the need to do this for a generation. it has been discussed in Government since the Bracks Government of 2000.
-No new gas mining
Policy: No new gas mining projects and move away from use of gas
as quickly as possible.
Reason: 16% of Victoria emissions are from burning gas, equivalent to 3.5% of all national emissions.
- End fossil fuel subsidies
Policy: Fossil fuel subsidies of $11.6B to be phased out following a review of the 2022-23 federal budget.
Reason: There should be a total end to inefficient taxpayer-funded spending on fossil fuel production. This includes funding to enable or accelerate exploration, construction of gas pipelines, power stations, coal mines and fossil-fuel derived hydrogen. No funding should be provided to federal government-owned bodies to build fossil fuel infrastructure.
Clean energy by 2030
Policy: All Victorian households to be powered with 100% clean energy by 2030, with all necessary training and awareness to enable it.
Reason: In tandem with my policy of net zero emissions by 2030, and Environment Victoria’s ‘Clean Energy for All’ campaign, Victorian households need to be supported to transition to all-electric by 2030. To support this, a public awareness campaign and training for careers in transition and clean energy is urgently needed. There is no time to waste: Victoria uses more gas than any other state, most for heating and hot water. Electric appliances are cheaper to run, safer for health, produce less pollution and elimate the need for more destructive gas mining and import projects.
- End new carbon capture and storage subsidies
Policy: No new taxpayer subsidies for carbon capture and storage (CCS)
Reason: No taxpayer money should be spent on CCS projects linked to gas, coal or oil projects. CCS is a failed technology, being used as an excuse for building new fossil fuel projects releasing significant new emissions.
- Coordination of Bay responsibilities including for inundation
Policy: Appointment of a Bay Minister to help coordinate the responsibilities of various bodies overseeing the bay’s water, fisheries, marine parks, foreshore vegetation and recreational activities including jet ski issues. The ministry should strongly include issues related to induction from sea-level rise from warmer oceans which expand and melting ice caps. Infrastructure to offset the impacts of this should be included.
Reason: A myriad of different organisations manage issues related to Port Phillip Bay. With the impacts of climate change already being seen in increased erosion and sea-level rise, it is vital to have a Minister to liaise across the various responsibilities with inundation infrastructure issues in their portfolio.
- Help local government prepare
Policy: Properly resource Bayside and Port Phillip councils to prepare for worsening extreme weather events.
Reason: Local governments should be better funded to undertake essential disaster functions and prepare for extreme weather risks, including climate adaptation. At a minimum, this should include restoring the share of taxation income councils receive to at least 1% of Commonwealth taxation revenue (up from 0.5% currently).
- Prepare infrastructure
Policy: Prepare critical infrastructure for extreme weather.
Reason: More extreme weather is already putting our energy, water, medical and transport systems under strain. More work is needed to future-proof Australia’s critical infrastructure to ensure it can reliably power the country in the face of worsening bushfires, higher temperatures, flooding and inundation risks from rising seas.
Result: Protection of homes, infrastructure and communities.
- Host the UN climate talks
Policy: The Australian Government, with councils in the Seat of Brighton, should bid to host the next global climate Conference.
Reason: Australia has had a disgraceful reputation at the UN climate talks which Sally has personally witnessed. As a developed nation, it has had a responsibility to show ambition which it has not done at all. This has impacts on trade. To improve this, the Australian Government should bid to host the annual Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change as soon as possible. This would help showcase Australia’s role in the global energy transition and would help improve its reputation as being committed to the rules-based international order. Australia should seek to co-host a UN climate summit with Pacific island nations.
- Increase and measure local Biodiversity
Policy: That the Bayside and Port Phillip Councils work together to set a measurable target for the continued increase of the biodiversity of Elwood, Brighton and Hampton and report annually to the community.
Reason: Biodiversity is a critical element in helping adaptions to changes in climate. Healthy ecosystems are more resilient to climate change.
Result: Improved local adaption to climate change.
Immediate ban on logging of native forests
Policy: Immediately ban logging of native forests and commence timber-worker transition
Reason: Victoria’s globally important forest ecosystems are collapsing because of industrial clear-fell logging and climate-fuelled bushfires. I was involved in the Regional Forest Agreements 20 years ago which were supposed to be a step away from native-tree logging to plantations. I am aghast that the state still logs native trees and has not helped transition timber workers yet.
Result: Retention of carbon locked in species like Mountain Ash and improved habitat for biodiversity thus supporting ecosystem-integrity.
- Citizens in charge
Policy: That the Government enact necessary laws to enable ordinary citizens to be involved in panels that make decisions relating to the appointment of senior bureaucratic and statutory positions, as well as major procurements where neutral overseas experts could be engaged.
Reason: The bureaucracy and polity needs to have checks and balances in key decision-making to strengthen our democracy from endemic corruption. Experts say such ‘soft’ corruption such as secret deals, pork-barrelling and ever-increasing favour-exchanges cost the taxpayer 50 cents in the dollar. Formal corruption commissions can deal with illegalities but the soft corruption can be intercepted by what is called deliberative democracy.
Result: Funds will be released to support all our basic services. Confidence in the public administration will increase and democracy will be strengthened.
- Election donations
Policy: That election campaigns be publicly funded.
Reason: Election donations are a key mechanism of corruption in our political system. They are signals that the donor will do business with the candidate or the party should they be successful and lead to an endemic system of favour-exchange which grows and, ultimately, undermines democracy.
Result: Improve the credibility of our political system and strengthen democracy.
- Revolving door
Policy: A ten-year ban on former MPs taking jobs or contracts directly or indirectly with private companies whose activities they have formerly regulated.
Reason: Execution of an MPs’ legal ministerial responsibilities are subject to corruption when, following political life, they move straight into a role with a private company whose activities they have formerly been responsible for regulating. This is a classic example of the corrupt ‘game of mates’ because it has the potential to influence ministerial decisions-making against the public interest.
Result: A reduction in corruption by improved ministerial responsibility and commensurate increased public confidence in government.
-Public hearings and more powers for IBAC
Policy: That hearings related to investigations of the Independent Broad-based Anti-Corruption Bureau (IBAC) be public
Reason: It is necessary to have public trust in IBAC. Making hearings public shows transparency in the process, essential for public confidence.
Result: More confidence in the polity and a strengthening of democracy.
- Detailed public parliamentary diary
Policy: Should I be elected, my parliamentary diary would be public showing who I have met with, specifically why and published weekly.
Reason: Public trust in MPs is at an all-time low: just over one third of people trust their state government. Secret lobbying leads to secret deals and games of mates which ultimately misuses our taxes. It leads to a collapse of behavioural cooperation with important policies. In NSW, ministers’ diaries are published quarterly with bare minimum information including the individual who was being met. For example, when the Premier met News Corp on 5/8/22, his diary does not specify who in the company and refers only to ‘NRL matters‘ as the purpose.
Result: Improved trust in MPs and better cooperation with policies which require public support for their success.
- Honours and awards
Policy: That the State Government lobby the Federal Government to ensure that only community volunteers be able to be nominated for Australian honours to the Council for the Order of Australia, 50% be women and the council include an indigenous representative.
Reason: The Australian honours system has become corrupted. The 2021 Sydney Morning Herald analysis of award recipients over 45 years found that highly networked individuals nominated each other, a quarter of the top 200 awardees were in The Australian Financial Review’s 2019 Rich List, 130 were directors of ASX 300 companies, those in the ‘Parliament and Politics’ category numbered 42, and ‘Business and Commerce’ leaders collected 48. More than 320 state and federal politicians have been honoured. Only 31% were women. There has not been an indigenous community representative on the council since 2012.
Result: Only worthy volunteers receive recognition they deserve and increased confidence in the award system
- Level-playing field for independents
Policy: That the Electoral Act 2002 be reviewed to ensure a level playing-field between self-funded independent candidates and political parties.
Reason: Currently, the electoral program of the Victorian Electoral Commission favours the resources of big political parties and disadvantages independents.
Result: Increasing the capacity of Independents representation increases diversity in our polity, undermines big party corruption and strengthens democracy.
- Protection from lockdowns
Policy: That Government exempt small business from mandatory closures and increase support during any future pandemic lockdown.
Reason: The impact of revolving lockdowns on Victorian small business, including the 2500 small businesses in the Seat of Brighton, was devastating for the sector: 43% temporarily closed, many did not survive and 72% are now concerned about business survival. What constituted “essential work” for tradespeople was unclear. Red-tape paperwork made it difficult for small businesses to apply for support in a timely way.
Result: A vibrant small business sector which supplies reliable services, products and jobs during stressful times.
- Tax reform
Policy: A range of taxes applying to small business be reviewed to enable new small businesses to consolidate and build. (provisional tax and GST caps, and deductions for digital tools, technologies and staff training).
Reason: Impacts of provisional tax on new small businesses can kill the enterprise before it is up and running. Yet small businesses are the backbone of the economy representing 98% of all Victorian businesses. There are more than 600,000 small businesses in Victoria and nearly 1500 in the Seat of Brighton alone. They make up nearly half of private sector jobs and contribute 36% of Victoria’s goods and services output.
Result: A thriving small business sector with attendant economic benefits including more jobs.
- Scrap first-home stamp duty
Policy: Stamp duty scrapped for first home buyers.
Reason: Victorians pay the highest stamp duty fee in the nation. 94% aspire to their own home but less than half will never achieve it. 50% of the cost of a house and land package is taxes, fees and charges. There are Concessions for purchases less than $750k but Melbourne’s medium house price is $918,350 with medium price in Elwood, Brighton and Hampton at $2,768,333. Seat of Brighton medium stamp duty is over $150,000.
Result: Increased affordability for first home buyers and an improvement in the proximity of their support networks.
- Close the pay gap
Policy: Close the pay gap between men and women.
Reason: In the last six months, women’s pay gap increased 0.3% to 14.1%. The current pay gap is equivalent of 61 days a year of pay which women are losing compared to their male colleagues, the equivalent of $260 less per week. Women pay a higher proportion of their income for costs such as rent so this is a clear issue of equality and fairness.
Result: Women and those with children as well as their families will be equal in the workplace with the ability to cover their costs equally.
- Free childcare
Policy: That childcare be free.
Reason: Working mothers face the dilemma of trying to keep workplace continuity by using a significant proportion of their wages on childcare or not working at all. Policies that make it easier for women to choose to go back to work will see the country recover faster from the pandemic economic crisis. It will also deliver $140B in benefits for all Australians over the long term. Spending money on things like childcare creates more jobs per $1M spent that expenditure in areas like construction.
Result: If childcare, like early education, was free, it would release working mothers to progress their careers with a commensurate increase in the tax revenue and other economic benefits like economic growth.
-Equal opportunity
Policy: That women have equal opportunity in the workplace.
Reason: Equal opportunity, also called equality of opportunity, means that people ought to be able to compete on equal terms for advantaged offices and positions. High levels of income inequality are linked to economic instability, financial crisis, debt and inflation. This year, more of the ASX 300 firms had no women in their executive roles than the same time last year: 47 companies had no women in executive roles compared to 44 in 2021.
Result: When employees feel their workplace opportunities are fairly distributed, they are happier, more motivated, plan to stay longer, better serve a diverse range of customers, improve ideas and problem-solving and are more likely to recommend their organisation as a great place to work.
- Enforce Intervention orders
Policy: Police better enforce Family Violence Intervention Orders with performance targets.
Reason: Police enforcement of Family Violence Intervention Orders (IVO) is weak. It renders many IVOs merely pieces of paper and puts women and children at even greater risk. In 2011-2020, there were 294,591 IVOs issued, with 316,668 recorded breaches but only 112,988 breaches (35.68%) received a sentence.
Result: A safer society with more confidence in police.
- Local Police outlets
Policy: Police outlets for Brighton and Elwood and more police on the beat.
Reason: The current police station servicing Brighton is almost as far from the centre of the Seat around Head Street as the CBD is. Elwood lost its police station decades ago with no community consultation and, now, residents in Head Street in the south of Elwood have to travel 3.7 kilometres to the nearest station in St Kilda.
Criminals need to see police on the street as a deterrent.
Result: Citizens are safer and have more confidence in police.
- Suburban crime information
Policy: That the citizens of Elwood, Brighton and Hampton be better informed about crime by the Victorian Crime Statistics Agency producing its crime statistics by suburb and not just by Local Government Area.
Reason: Currently, Victoria’s Crime Statistics Agency provides crime statistics by Local Government Area only. This means that it is not possible to ascertain the prevalence of crime in, say, Elwood, which is in the City of Port Phillip, from St Kilda, which likely has a very different crime profile.
- More say for victims
Policy: Victims to have a say on the sentencing of their perpetrators.
Reason: Currently, victims can only make a Victim Impact Statement to the court in relation to a crime against them. If they express a view on sentencing, judges cannot take it into account. The Sentencing Act needs to be amended to enable this. Victims who appeal sentencing, have no say in whether they thought the sentence was just or properly warranted.
Result: More justice and more confidence in the justice system.
- Screening and treatment of prisoners with disability
Policy: That all prisoners on entry to prison be screened for all disabilities including autism and mental illnesses and receive evidence-based treatment.
Reason: It costs Victorian taxpayers $323.45 per day ($118,059.25 annually) to house a prisoner. With some 65% of prisoners having a diagnosed mental illness and an indeterminate number with a cognitive disability, which may have influenced their criminal behaviour, it makes economic and social sense to supply evidence-based treatment incarceration.
Result: More human rights for prisoners with a disability and fewer costs for taxpayers due to reduced recidivism.
-Free Identity documents
Policy: Victorians have free access to their electronic identity documents from Births, Deaths and Marriages.
Reason: Vital life documents help citizens integrate their identity by locating lost or unknown family. Currently, the cost of an electronic birth, death or marriage certificate in Victoria is $20 which is prohibitive in the current cost-of-living crisis.
Result: An improved sense of belonging, better health and potentially increased support networks.
Policies may be updated during the course of the campaign in line with new information and/or expert advice. Those in relation to Gambling and Public Housing are in development, including with experts but are imminent.
-Increase education effectiveness
Policy: The Government improve the evidence for the effectiveness of its policies, programs and practices in schools, early childhood education and care services to identify what works best, for whom and in what circumstances. Turn best practice into common practice.
Reason: The Australian Productivity Commission in its latest report on education (2022) found the biggest gap was the lack of evidence of the effectiveness of our education system.
Result: Students are better prepared for further education and employment.
-Tertiary placement allowance
Policy: Tertiary students in the Seat of Brighton and elsewhere who are required to undertake an industry placement longer than two weeks in duration, be given an daily Centrelink allowance to enable them to have a liveable wage.
Reason: Many students are required to attend an industry placement as part of their degree course. This is either several days a week or full time putting considerable stress on their budgets, and mental and physical health. Many are trying to both work and undertake the placement.
-Reduce state debt
Policy: Reduce the State Government debt.
Reason: The State Government debt is currently at $101B rising to $190.9B by 2025, representing 32.8% of the State Gross Product. In late 2020, the Standard and Poors credit rating dropped from AAA to AA. In February 2021, Moody’s dropped its rating from Aa2.
It will cost Victorian taxpayers over $20B over the next four years. This “constrains the state’s capacity to respond to future shocks” [Moody’s].
Result: Victoria lives within its means and future generations are not bankrupted by galloping interest bills. Enables Victoria to better meet the costs of climate change impacts.
-Accelerate action on multi-national tax avoidance
Policy: The State Government apply pressure on the Federal Government to continue work to ensure multi-national companies pay tax on their Australian profits.
Reason: Australia loses $6B annually in lost tax revenue by multi national corporations (2016 figures) by their use of tax havens.
Result: More taxes for essential services especially climate change related costs. Citizens have a sense of fairness in the tax system.
-Better public transport links
Policy: More transparency in contracts for private bus services to ensure timetables designed to meet trains and trams are met.
Reason: Private bus services in Elwood, Brighton and Hampton cannot be relied on to reliably connect with public tram and train timetables. This increases the likelihood that commuters use private vehicles thus increasing congestion and greenhouse emissions.
Result: Citizens get to work, school and other appointments more reliably and are encouraged to take public transport, thus reducing congestion and greenhouse emissions.
-Accessible lift for Gardenvale station
Policy: That an accessible lifts be installed to both platforms at Gardenvale Station which is also sufficiently large for bicycles.
Reason: Currently, Gardenvale station is inaccessible for citizens with a mobility issue.
Result: More citizens with a mobility issue using public transport thus increasing inclusion and reducing fossil fuel emissions from vehicle use.
-Australian content
Policy: Increase Australian content in all major streaming services by reinvestment of 20% of Australian revenue in local commissions; quotas for commercial free-to-air networks be restored.
Reason: Currently, Australia content on the small screen is rare with impacts on the sense of an Australian identity and diminishment of the local industry. This policy would deliver $336M in investment, and create an additional 10,000 industry jobs.
Result: An improved sense of Australian identity and support for the local industry with commensurate economic benefits including more jobs and ongoing experience for creative industry workers.
-Local arts space
Policy: A local arts incubation space where creatives can collaborate with others in their field and test out their work.
Reason: There is nowhere in the Seat of Brighton for the many creatives living in the area to link up and collaborate.
Result: A more vibrant local arts scene.
-Fair share of opera programs
Policy: That the State Government ensure that Victoria receives its share of the Opera Australia Program commensurate with its contribution.
Reason: Currently, the State Government contributes $1M annually to Opera Australia but is not receiving a commensurate share of its program.
Result: A more vibrant opera scene and increased opportunities for employment for local artists.
-Climate change in planning
Policy: That the Planning and Environment Act be amended to include climate change impacts.
Reason: Planning decisions are ignoring the view of the community resulting in decisions and structures which are at odds with the character and amenity of the community.
Result: A more contented community with certainty of character and amenity enabling
residents to plan their futures with confidence.
-Restore VCAT to a people’s tribunal
Policy: That VCAT be restored to its original role as the people’s tribunal with parties representing themselves.
Reason: Currently, developers who do not agree with local council’s planning decisions routinely take their proposals to VCAT. They are permitted to be represented by lawyers including QCs. The community then has to expend money and energy to mount a case at that same level. This both undermines the power of local government to make binding decisions for its community, and also undermines the community’s ability to influence its own environment. It’s confidence in its council and the justice system is thus badly eroded.
Result: Improved amenity and character of our suburbs, a more contented community and increased confidence in the justice system.
-More funding for volunteer Community Visitors
Policy: Provision of additional funding for volunteer Community Visitors to assist with the technology and resources required to effectively fullfill its important safeguarding role
Reason: The changes to the Residential Tenancies Act 1997, the introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and the Mental Health Royal Commission recommendations have put additional pressure on Victoria’s volunteer Community Visitors to fulfil their legislated role. They safeguard Victorians from abuse, violence, neglect and exploitation, including residents in disability group houses, mental health facilities and Supported Residential Services in the Seat of Brighton and servicing the same. They lack appropriate technology and resources to report their findings.
-Full disability toilet facilities
Policy: That all toilet amenities in Elwood, Brighton and Hampton include all facilities necessary for citizens with a disability of all ages.
Reason: Currently, amenities for people with disability, especially adults in the care of their families or services, are limited. This affects the inclusion of both the person with disability and their family and carers.
Result: A more inclusive bayside community.
Policies may be updated during the course of the campaign in line with new information and/or expert advice. Those in relation to Gambling and Public Housing are in development, including with experts but are imminent.
- Better care in hospital
Policy: Better continuity of care in hospital including seamless nursing and closer liaison with patient GPs.
Reason: Building new hospitals does not improve health outcomes. Patients need more seamless care in hospital by being attended by the same set of nurses during their admission, better integration of GP patient information into hospital care regimes, improvements in staff occupational English, and better monitoring of patient dietary intake.
Result: Earlier recovery and cost savings from shorter admissions.
-Reduce childhood obesity
Policy: State Government to fund evidence-based programs that reduce childhood overweight and obesity.
Reason: Overweight and obesity are the second biggest contributors to Australia’s health costs at $12B annually. Children are particularly vulnerable. There are evidence-based programs including online for children 7-13 years who are above a healthy weight, and their families.
Result: Better health for children including over the lifetime and reduced healthcare costs for the community,.
Policy: The State Government develop a plan with deadlines for the implementation of its LGBTIQ+ strategy 2022-2032.
Reason: The State Government has published a strategy for equality and inclusion in all government work for the 1:20 Victorians who identify as LGBTIQ+. However, the strategy, Pride in our future: Victoria’s LGBTIQ+ strategy 2022-2932, lacks a plan with clear deadlines. This risks the strategy aims drifting.
Result: More confidence by the LGBTIQ+ community in government and a greater likelihood that the strategy will be implemented; a more inclusive community.
- Other policies
As part of my LGBTIQ+ policies, I am also adopting the ten-point plan of Equality Australia.
Policies may be updated during the course of the campaign in line with new information and/or expert advice. Those in relation to Gambling and Public Housing are in development, including with experts but are imminent.
Policy:
Better policing of incidents of anti-semitism and a community-wide cultural awareness program
Reason:
Members of the Jewish community continue to experience anti-Semitism and are concerned for their own safety and that of their families. Police follow-up of incidents is weak.
Result:
A safer, more inclusive and better-informed community generally..
Policy: Endorse a public health approach prioritizing harm prevention:
• Close pokie venues from midnight to 10am and Crown Casino from 1am to 10am
• Cashless gambling card with verified identity mandatory for all clubs and pubs and for Crown Casino; outlaw note acceptors on machines that facilitate money laundering]. Card-based play and ID related individual cards facilitating statewide self-exclusion. No changes to limits within a 24-hour period and a scheme top-up/transation cap.
• Mandatory customer setting of limits to amount spent gambling in 24 hours
• Off-site regulatory monitoring of cards for money laundering and crime
• $1 maximum bet for every button press of the pokie machines
• No EFTPOS from club and pub pokie venue cash registers
• Reform EGM machine features that disguise losses as wins, show near misses etcetera
• Put the onus on venues to intervene when seeing signs of problem gambling
• Lobby federal government on sports betting TV advertising [under communications legislation]
endorse the reforms of the 60 organisations in the Alliance for Gambling Reform [Tim Costello]
• Reduce EGMs in Victoria (‘Sinking lid’ policy where venues give up or surrender machines, those licenses lapse with the aim of reducing the number of machines in Victorian community venues.)
- Crown Casino
• A national regulator for Australian casinos following inquiries of money laundering, associations: state governments are too seduced by the gambling tax revenue
• Photo ID at entry so the regulator knows who is in the casino
• Cashless gambling linked to regulatory money laundering checking
• Transparency of the regulator’s interim ‘manager’ currently liaising with management and board with quarterly public reporting
Reason:
Bayside gambling 2021: indicative figures for Brighton electorate
[NB venue statistics don’t align with electorates]
• Yearly spend $7.4m spent on pokies; $35,850 spent on pokies per day [for 207 operational days in 2020-2021]
• 5 venues with pokies with over 200 machines
• Crown Casino with approx. 2700 machines, over 500 casino tables and dedicated sports betting bars and VIP rooms, only a short drive away
• Victoria has a ‘machine/population’ approach. Municipal limits were introduced in 2009 and cover nearly all municipal areas of Victoria at a ratio of 10 gaming machines per 1000 adults. If population rises, the limit may increase because Bayside is not in a region where the number of pokies is capped
• The gambling industry has poured over $50m into Federal electoral donations and $18m into donations to State/territory elections. Gambling tax revenue accounts for 13% of the Victorian tax take.
• Pokies are a scourge on communities with high associations with homelessness, marriage breakdown, domestic violence, mental illness, crime and suicide. For every problem gambler, approximately 10 others are affected negatively.
• From 2014-15 in Victoria, gambling harm cost Victoria nearly $7B which included financial, emotional and psychological, family, crime, work and government costs of harm. (Browne et al., 2017)
- Online betting
This is a huge problem affecting many families with the intrusiveness of online sports betting and in-your-face TV ads. Unfortunately, TV is regulated by the federal government but Victoria can tax online betting organisations. However, it does so at a rate lower than clubs and pubs and lower than other states.
In 2021, the Andrews government lifted the rate to 10%, in line with NSW, but significantly lower than South Australia, Western Australia, Queensland and the ACT which take 15%. Queensland is raising its to 20%. With foreign operators, most of the profits go offshore. [The Age]
Customers have questions, you have answers. Display the most frequently asked questions, so everybody benefits.
So far, in discussions across the community, you've told us you're concerned about:
Take the Seat of Brighton Survey below so we have as much evidence as possible on which to base our polices & act to change the game.
Subject experts will also be consulted.
Overdevelopment against the community's wishes is a chronic issue.
The reasons relate to Sally's call to Change the Game. Decisions must be made in alignment with community wishes.
Authorised by N. Nicols, 5/18 Scott St., Elwood
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