Poker Machine Licences Victoria
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The Office of Liquor and Gaming Regulation (OLGR) regulates electronic machine gaming in Queensland under the Gaming Machine Act 1991. This includes issuing licences to:
- existing liquor licensees (individuals or organisations) who wish to provide gaming machine services
- individuals and organisations who wish to supply, monitor or service gaming machines (i.e. licensed monitoring operators, manufacturers, licensed testing facility operators and secondary dealers)
- individuals seeking employment in the gaming industry in Queensland.
There is a statewide cap on the total number of gaming machines that can operate in Queensland's hotels and clubs. Under the Electronic Gaming Machine Reallocation Scheme:
In 2013-14, poker machines in NSW made $5.4 billion. As a proportion of that revenue, $92 million is 1.7%. As a proportion of that revenue, $92 million is 1.7%. Poker machines would be phased out of pubs and clubs in Victoria within a decade under a Greens policy that would tear up a new 20-year licensing deal legislated by the state Labor government last.
- A venue operator licence enables an entity to operate gaming machines in Victoria. Venue operator licences are granted a licence for up to 10 years. Venue operators must apply to renew approval before the expiry date to continue their licence.
- There will be no extra poker machines in Victoria until 2042, after the Andrews Government froze the number of pokies as part of a suite of reforms to the industry.
- The Gambling and Lotteries Licence Independent Review Panel (the Panel) was formed in accordance with the Gambling Regulation Act 2003 (Vic) (the Act) to independently and publicly report on the gambling licensing processes under the Act as well as relevant regulatory reviews.
- licensees that operate a commercial hotel have to bid for 'gaming machine operating authorities' under a competitive tender process
- licensees that operate a community club may apply to transfer 'gaming machine entitlements' with another club or bid for entitlements under a competitive tender process.
This guide explains the different licences that relate to machine gaming in Queensland. It also provides an overview of the Electronic Gaming Machine Reallocation Scheme and the process for disposing of or surrendering gaming machines.
- Last reviewed: 24 Oct 2019
- Last updated: 24 Oct 2019
General enquiries 13 QGOV (13 74 68)
- Licence and permit enquiries
1300 072 322
OLGRlicensing@justice.qld.gov.au
- Gaming compliance enquiries
- Liquor compliance enquiries
- Media enquiries (07) 3738 8556
One of the claims made by poker machine clubs in Australia is that they provide significant support to local communities. Usually this is signified by the support clubs provide to causes such as junior football clubs or charities.
In New South Wales, the state with the most poker machines and the most poker machine expenditure, peak body Clubs NSW claims to have distributed A$92 million in grants last year. That’s a lot of money.
But, as a percentage of total poker machine revenue, it’s quite modest. In 2013-14, poker machines in NSW made $5.4 billion. As a proportion of that revenue, $92 million is 1.7%.
In 2012, the lead author of this article and colleagues found that the level of contributions clubs made to actual community purposes was low as a proportion of poker machine revenue. It ranged from 1.3% in NSW to 6.6% in the Australian Capital Territory.
The data gap
In 2010, the Productivity Commission argued that although clubs made community contributions:
The claimed benefits of gambling revenue on sporting activities and volunteering do not appear strong. Indeed, the presence of gambling may adversely affect volunteering rates.
The (gross) value of social contributions by clubs is likely to be significantly less than the support governments provide to clubs through tax and other concessions.
Given this, there are strong grounds for the phased implementation of significantly lower levels of gaming revenue tax concessions for clubs, commensurate with the realised community benefits.
Clubs, generally incorporated as “not for profit” mutual organisations, do not pay corporate tax and usually benefit from reduced gambling tax rates compared to corporate gambling operators.
One of the difficulties noted in the 2012 study was that data on the actual poker machine revenue gained by clubs are not publicly available in NSW and Queensland; in the ACT and Victoria, these data are published. This gap in data availability makes it difficult to determine how much particular clubs are actually providing to the community compared to what they make from that community via the losses of people using poker machines.
In Victoria, club pokie venues are required to submit an annual community benefit statement, which demonstrates that they have provided at least 8.3% of their pokie revenue to community purposes. If they do this, they get a reduction of 8.3% on the gambling tax they pay, compared to hotel venues.
Venues don’t pay corporate tax. And when the GST was introduced, poker machine taxes were reduced proportionately. The tax breaks pokie venues get are quite significant, and the Productivity Commission’s comment about these arrangements was based on this rather special treatment.
What do we know?
Recently, we examined the most recent consolidated set of community benefit statements lodged in Victoria for 2013-14. Various categories of claims are available under the Ministerial Order prescribing these claims, including the venue’s operating costs – such as wages, insurance, electricity costs and renovations or equipment.
We found that contributions to what most people would regard as genuine community benefits were very low. This category includes philanthropic and charitable purposes and gifts provided to community organisations. Across the entire club sector in Victoria, community benefit statement claims amounted to A$273.7 million in 2013-14. Of this, 6.8% – or A$18.5 million – was classed as “donations, gifts and sponsorships”.
In contrast, $209.4 million – 76.5% of claims – went to operating expenses, including wages, superannuation, management costs and insurances.
As a proportion of total club pokie losses ($846 million), donations, gifts and sponsorship amounted to 2.2%.
We examined three major Victorian AFL clubs – Carlton, Collingwood and Geelong – all of which operate multiple gambling venues.
In its 2013 report, Carlton claimed more than A$1.1 million in contributions to sporting facilities from the four pokie venues it operates – all of which went to Ikon Park, its training base for elite AFL footballers in inner-city Melbourne.
In 2014, no such claims were made. Instead, Carlton made claims of donations of nearly A$1.3 million to Ikon Park. These were regarded as donations, gifts and sponsorships, rather than sporting subsidies.
Nonetheless, these amounts went to the same purpose – one that arguably fails to provide little if any benefit to residents of the outer suburbs where their pokie venues are located.
Collingwood claimed donations, gifts and sponsorships of A$180,000 from its two club venues in 2014. The overwhelming majority of its community benefit statement claims (more than $1.8 million) were operating costs – wages, superannuation and so forth.
Geelong operates two club venues. In 2014, it claimed donations gifts and sponsorships of A$111,000. The majority of its claims were for the operating costs of the venue – A$1.5 million, 93% of the total claimed.
Poker Machine Licences Victoria Virginia
Gaming Machine Licence Victoria
What now?
It’s clear claims by clubs that they provide significant benefits to the community are overstated.
Greater benefits could be provided by applying the additional tax collected from hotel venues – in Victoria’s case this would be 8.3%, or more than A$70 million per year – and from the imposition of corporate tax on gambling revenues, particularly in the case of large clubs such as big NSW clubs. These are, in many ways, little different from large commercial operations.
Some clubs do provide genuine benefits to their communities. Unfortunately, clubs have developed significant poker machine dependency – an average of about 60% of total revenue. Some club representatives may gild the lily in their claims of community support, fearful perhaps of the consequences of more effective harm-minimising regulation or fairer taxation.
But to have a meaningful debate about the pros and cons of widespread pokie gambling, we also need to be able to understand exactly what they contribute, and what they cost in adverse community impacts. Given the data blackout that prevails in NSW and Queensland, we’re a long way from achieving that right now.
This article is part of our special package on poker machines. See the other articles here: