Submission to The Department of Internal Affairs

The Dept. of Internal Affairs (DIA) recently conducted a review on online gambling in New Zealand. They presented several options of how online gambling could be regulated, and possibly expanded. Our Salvation Army submission challenged the DIA options. One of our main views is that online gambling has the potential to be even more dangerous than electronic gaming machines or pokies because of the ease of access, hidden nature and other key factors. Our contention is that the ideal framing of this DIA Review should be centred on harm minimisation and prevention and the fulfilment of section 3(a) of the Gambling Act which states unequivocally that one of the main purposes of this Act is to control the growth of gambling.