Auckland City Council
Media release

26 March 2010

New policy for gambling venues in Auckland city

A new gambling venue policy for Auckland city was approved by Auckland City Council yesterday and comes into effect on 1 June 2010. 

The new policy takes a ‘sinking lid with relocations’ approach for gaming machine and New Zealand Racing Board (NZRB) venues.

The new policy will continue to prevent any increase in the number of venues and gaming machines in the city.  However, it does allow existing venues to move to new premises, under the following circumstances:

the new venue replaces an existing venue in the city
the new venue meets location controls around community facilities, vulnerable areas and other gambling venues
for gaming machine venues, the new location must operate fewer machines than the venue it is replacing.

The council has been through an extensive process to develop the new policy. This includes a review of the existing policy, analysis of research and data on gambling, consideration of alternative options and obtaining feedback from problem gambling groups, health providers, venue operators, corporate societies, the New Zealand Racing Board, business and shopping associations and community boards.

A draft policy was endorsed in September 2009 for public consultation, resulting in 3,853 written submissions and 47 oral submissions being made to a hearings panel of three councillors. 

Councillor Paul Goldsmith, who chaired the panel during oral submissions says, “We heard and read many submissions from groups and individuals who wanted to tighten the rules and from community groups, including the Cancer Society of New Zealand, the Order of St John, Auckland Theatre Company and numerous sports clubs, who value the source of funding that this activity generates and who opposed the existing sinking lid.  We also heard about some of the perverse consequences of the current very restrictive sinking lid policy. 

“The revised policy strikes a better balance between the desire to minimise problem gambling and the desire to maintain an important stream of community funding.”

The council’s previous ‘sinking lid’ approach was introduced in 2004, and has resulted in a decrease in the total number of machines in Auckland city. However, research and consultation has highlighted that the sinking lid:

keeps gaming machines and venues in their current locations and does not allow venues to relocate to improved premises
has a significant negative impact on the amount of gaming machine proceeds made available to community groups.
       
“The new policy will continue to reduce the number of gambling machines over time, and allows a means for venues and gaming machines to move out of vulnerable and over-represented areas of the city, whilst continuing to meet harm minimisation criteria” says Mr Goldsmith.

Applicants requesting a new venue consent will be required to pay an application fee to cover the administration and processing costs incurred by the council. The recent Regulatory fees and charges special consultation procedure is being used to seek public feedback on the proposed fee of $350. This process is expected to be completed in May 2010.

Ends

© Scoop Media