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Opinion: A friend recently told me about a surge of interest in sports betting from his teenagers and their mates, so when I saw the media release from the Problem Gambling Foundation it resonated.
“We are hearing from parents about their children discussing sports betting at school,” spokeswoman Andree Froude said. “We don’t want to see a whole new demographic experiencing harm from gambling.”
You might have seen the huge advertising campaign for sports betting that the PGF was concerned about. It’s been blasting across billboards, TikTok and television in recent weeks, as a newly invigorated TAB tries to convince young people that betting isn’t a shameful vice that will die with the boomers.
The TAB has launched a new betting platform named betcha, aimed at under-35s new to betting.
It’s part of a rebranding exercise driven by Entain, one of the world’s largest betting agencies, which has global revenues of more than NZ$10 billion. It has signed a 25-year deal with the TAB.
Under the terms of the deal, announced in May 2023, Entain will deliver TAB’s betting and broadcast operations in return for a 50-50 revenue share. This has supercharged the TAB, which says the Entain deal, will deliver a “total uplift in payments to racing and sports” of about $5 billion over the 25-year arrangement.
Part of the hustle is taking the TAB to a new generation. Hence the new brand betcha, where you can bet on cricket, table tennis, basketball, boxing, tennis - you name it, even volleyball if you want.
The website spiel is aimed to dispel the notion of the crusty old punter: “You won’t find us reaching for our binoculars as they turn for the final straight. Or flicking through a dusty form guide. Because we’re for the new breed of bettor.”
The betcha brand is big on the social side of gambling. I guess that beats gambling alone but do we really need to link a love of sport to gambling? One in five of us already experiences harm from our own or someone else’s gambling, according to the Ministry of Health, which says New Zealanders lost $2.7b at the TAB, Lotto, casinos and pokies last year.
No one with any appreciation of history would try to ban gambling, but rather than simply tolerating it in New Zealand, we promote, advertise, celebrate and, in some cases, rely on the proceeds of it.
The reboot of the TAB is one of two major reforms in the New Zealand gaming market happening now.
The government, looking for ways to plug gaping revenue holes, is to allow offshore gambling sites to offer online casino games in New Zealand.
Up to 15 online casino licences, to operate between 2026 and 2029, are to be auctioned off, under a process recently outlined by Internal Affairs Minister, Act’s Brooke van Velden. Her Cabinet paper says the online gambling operators will be able to advertise and do sponsorship deals in New Zealand, so prepare for a publicity blitz from them, too.
The government says New Zealanders are already gambling on offshore sites so it may as well licence them, take the tax revenue and provide better oversight. The new online casinos won’t be required to have a physical presence in New Zealand but will pay a gaming duty of 12% of betting revenue and the problem gambling levy.
The Cabinet paper concedes that “gambling harm may increase, especially because online casino gambling is likely to be at the riskier end of the gambling spectrum.”
The 2020 Health and Lifestyles Survey showed 105,000 New Zealanders played offshore gambling sites that year (it would be much higher now) and 15% of those were moderate-risk or problem gamblers:
“Compared to other forms of gambling surveyed, overseas online gamblers were most likely to experience harm from their gambling.”
The Cabinet paper says offshore gambling operators won’t have to give back to the community. It says while gambling money can benefit communities, it “also creates perverse incentives to increase gambling activity as a means to increase revenue streams for community organisations.”
That’s interesting, given that the state gambling company, Lotto, does exactly that.
In fact, van Velden celebrated the allocation of $343 million of Lotto money in June with a press release saying that as “New Zealand continues to feel the impacts of rising costs” the grants were supporting communities “to build on their strengths and to develop their long-term aspirations”.
But the grants are a giant (and very sloppy) money-go-round. New Zealanders spend $1.5b on Lotto each year but just 25 cents in the dollar goes to charities after Lotto pays prizes, taxes and operating costs. Lotto sales have been rising and it’s unlikely it will shuffle aside for the new sports and offshore betting agencies.
We will soon have a new trifecta: rising Lotto sales, a rebooted TAB and offshore gambling sites. If I was a betting man I’d wager that gambling harm will increase under those conditions.
Guyon Espiner is an investigative journalist and presenter at RNZ, who hosts TV and radio interview show 30 with Guyon Espiner. He writes a fortnightly column for listener.co.nz
