KEY POINTS:
New Zealand gambling is on the rise, and non-casino pokies seem to be leading the increase.
The annual gambling expenditure figures released yesterday showed spending increased by 2.2 per cent to $2.02 billion in the 2006/2007 period.
Internal Affairs gambling policy manager John Markland said the rise followed a decrease during 2005/2006 when the total expenditure dropped to $1.977 billion.
"The reversal is due largely to players spending 5 per cent more on pub and club pokies, the non-casino gaming machines," he said.
"This partly reverses the trend from the previous two years, when players spent less on these machines."
The statistics showed pokies accounted for $950 million of the gambling expenditure, up 5 per cent from last year. By contrast, casino gambling was down 4.7 per cent, accounting for $469 million.
Mr Markland said the non-casino gaming machine trend was consistent with overseas experience following the introduction of smoke-free legislation.
"Spending drops initially then creeps back up over a period of up to five years. Rates of growth, though, tend to remain below what they were before the ban."
Problem Gambling Foundation chief executive John Stansfield also attributed the increase in pokie use to the smoke-free legislation, and said unless there was major reform to the Gambling Act, the upward trend would continue.
"The casinos are in a competition with the pokie trusts for a growing group of gamblers with out-of-control pokie habits, but the trusts have the advantage of venues on every street corner in poor areas where the customers live."
He said the machines were successful at getting people to gamble more often and for longer, often with tragic or criminal consequences.
- NZPA
