KEY POINTS:
New Zealanders are still gambling on a big Lotto win despite - or perhaps because of - the economic crisis.
Gambling trusts and the Lottery Grants Board say their funding is holding up relatively well, in contrast to other charitable funders such as the ASB Trust which have suffered heavy losses.
Spending on poker machines in pubs and clubs dropped by just 6 per cent in the last quarter of last year compared with the same time the year before, and betting at the races is 10 per cent below budget.
But Lotteries Commission spokeswoman Karen Jones said the commission was about to post a bumper half-year profit after record betting on last year's $30 million Lotto jackpot, and Lotto sales were still running at about the same level as a year ago.
"You can buy a Lotto ticket for as little as $2.40, so a lot of people are still holding on to that piece of hope."
Lottery profits distributed through the Lottery Grants Board have risen in the past two years from $110 million to $147 million, partly because of the launch of the mid-week game Big Wednesday.
Charity Gaming Association chief executive Francis Wevers said the conventional wisdom was that gambling turnover rose in bad economic times as people became more desperate.
But he said the new electronic monitoring system installed for pokies in all pubs and clubs from March 2007 showed that pokie spending had actually dropped.
Pub Charity chief executive Martin Cheer said the fall started around May last year when petrol hit $2 a litre.
