August 9, 2007

Pokie drop from Helicopter

A new world record is expected to be set at the Redvale landfill near Dairy Flat tomorrow.

Aucklander Alastair Galpin will drop up to five pokie machines out of a helicopter from a height of at least 500 feet.

Alastair holds a number of world records and will be carrying out tomorrow's attempt under the auspices of the Record Holders Republic.

He usually tries to tie his record breaking events to a charity to help highlight the issues they are concerned with.

In this instance he has chosen to highlight the damage done to families and the community by pokie machines.

The Problem Gambling Foundation is supporting Alastair in his attempt and says that many of their clients think a landfill is an appropriate place for pokie machines.

National Operations Manager Graham Aitken says that about 1.3 billion dollars is estimated to be lost on pokie machines every year and that the harm which this results in costs the community dearly.

"At least 80% of problem gambling can be sheeted back to the pokies in bars, clubs and casinos," he says.

"These machines could be made far less harmful through the use of new player tracking technology and good host responsibility but the gambling industry doesn't want to know about it.

"Norway has recently found a way of dealing with irresponsible pokie operators by instituting government-only operation of them.

"Trinidad and Tobago are going to ban them altogether.

"Here in New Zealand the gambling industry is still pretty much getting its own way."

What: Pokie drop from helicopter

Where: Redvale Landfill, Dairy Flat

When: Friday, August 10, 2007

ENDS

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