Paul Murphy Challenges Bingo Regulations, Demands Stronger Protections

I was mostly here to speak about amendment six but I was listening to the debate and obviously I've been aware about the public commentary and discussion and so on about the bingo issue and I mean what's clear for me is I'm in favour of increasing the amount that goes to charity to 25% I think that makes all the sense in the world I still don't quite understand why a maximum of 50% of the proceeds is down as going back to those who are playing bingo why can't that go up to I mean it's a maximum so if the running cost can be done with 5% well then why couldn't they go up to 70% could go back in proceeds to the players and the 25% would still go to charity and the running cost can be done on the 5% like if it can be topped up in any case why isn't this why isn't the maximum higher perhaps the minister could clarify that and I think it's important when we're tackling this issue to distinguish between two different interest groups one is the interest of those who play bingo those who go and use it a very important community outlet for people which it's clear I'm absolutely on their side and against anything that would impact on their ability to play bingo the second issue and it is a separate group of interest and we have to be aware of it is the big bingo companies and which I accept that most of the bingos outside of the big cities aren't of that character they don't go over the 5,000 euros but in in Dublin these are big corporations who have the money to hire pure companies and so on and I think they have a separate interest of the players and that interest is to minimise the amount of money that goes to charities and therefore to maximise the amount of money that goes to profits and I think we have to clearly take a stand against that and I'll just raise one point because the minister said it in response there in relation to the broader issue here which is the minister said that if someone has a gambling problem well then they're going to spend and spend and spend if they have an addiction problem and I take that point but the problem is that the government in what it's proposing here and yes they've reduced it from 10 to 5 but is facilitating that you know if you have a situation where you now have a maximum bet per game of 5 euro 800 times what the previous limit was and as a previous deputy has referred to you can potentially have a situation where multiple games can be played at one point in time you can be playing 5 games at once you could do 5 games a minute in the course of an hour so in the course of an hour you could be doing 1,500 euros and people therefore a huge amount of money very very quickly people going broke people who have addiction problems so I think that's wrong what the minister is proposing to do there I mean I agree with the reduction from 10 to 5 if 5 is better than 10 but I don't think 5 is the answer and I think particularly that's the case when we have the highest gross gambling revenue by capita per capita in Europe we have up to 40,000 problem gamblers and yet we have no dedicated gambling addiction treatment service we've never had a gambling prevalence study and there's no state agency dedicated to reducing gambling related harm I think this issue is being massively underestimated and not being tackled by the government and we've just spoken about like an element of the interest that exists within gambling there's much bigger interest than the bigger bingo companies and they have you know are making substantial profits in this country and I think we shouldn't be facilitating the exploitation of people who have addiction problems who are experienced who are you know in a context of increased alienation a community fragmentation poor mental health the lack of government investment and supports for people that being filled in some cases with an addiction and problem gambling yeah thanks thank you deputy murphy and You