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Australia's Internet gambling faces controls

CANBERRA: Australia's fast-growing Internet gambling industry should be controlled with measures to help problem gamblers and limit Internet casinos, a parliamentary committee recommended on Thursday.

"We looked at the possibility of being able to ban Internet gambling in Australia, but there are some legal and technical difficulties," Jeannie Ferris, chairwoman of the Senate inquiry, told a news conference.

Instead the committee recommended a series of measures to make online gambling more difficult and address Prime Minister John Howard's concerns that excessive gambling was destroying thousands of lives.

The inquiry was initiated by Howard last December when an official report confirmed Australia had one of the world's highest rates of gambling and found that 300,000 of its 19 million people had a betting problem.

Measures recommended to reduce online gambling included outlawing direct credit card online gambling, pre-determined betting amounts, limited gambling times and a permanent screen display of financial loss and gain.

The committee suggested that until these policies were adopted by all six Australian states and two territories, a ban be placed on issuing online gambling licences on top of the 14 already in existence.

"The report establishes a framework for the regulation of Australia's online gambling industry to promote safe and responsible gambling," said Ferris, a member of the ruling Liberal Party.

"The moratorium will provide an incentive to the states and territories to adopt our recommendations."

A ministerial council on gambling was set up by Howard at the end of 1999 after the Productivity Commission report made front page news of Australia's gambling problem. The report said Australia's problem gamblers lost A$3.5 billion a year (US$2.1 billion) and represented one third of all gamblers.

The Senate committee will present its report, Netbets - A review of online gambling in Australia,' to the ministerial council examining ways of curbing the growth of gambling.

Although gambling in Australia is primarily regulated by the states and territories, the national government is responsible for Internet gambling.-Reuters