A young life ‘dominated by gambling’: Victorian coroner delivers stinging findings on death of 22-year-old

Hudson had engaged in problem gambling throughout much of the four years, and “as a consequence, he suffered significant gambling harm, which increased as time progressed”, the coroner found.

“The impact went far beyond the money Kyle lost. Online gambling had taken over so much of his life. This is made crystal clear in the astonishing measurements of his betting activity,” he said.

Hudson sustained an overall net loss of more than $47,000 through gambling, a forensic accounting analysis had shown, but the coroner found it would have been difficult for Hudson to have known precisely how high his tally of losses was. The coroner recommended the federal government change the consumer framework to require online betting companies to prominently display customers’ net financial position over time in their accounts.

Hudson redeemed 489 inducements over the four years he was gambling. There could be “little doubt” that the promotions and inducements Hudson received over the years “catalysed Kyle’s betting behaviour” and had a “contrary and corrosive impact” on the effect of any of the gambling companies’ safer gambling efforts, the coroner said.

Gambling companies provided the details of their advertising budgets to the court confidentially, under a claim of commercial sensitivity. Lawrie did not reveal those figures, but on Tuesday described them as “a level of expenditure on gambling advertising in Australia that is arresting”.

“It is close to impossible to move through the modern world without being exposed to [gambling] advertising,” Lawrie said.

“Kyle did not decide out of nowhere to open his first betting account on his 18th birthday … There can be little doubt that Kyle began his online gambling as soon as he could because he was primed by the phenomenon that was swirling about him before he turned 18.”

He recommended the Australian government consider further restrictions, including prohibitions on advertising for online gambling, and establish a national online gambling regulator to oversee licensing, safety, gambling harm interventions and data collection.

He also recommended the government establish and fund an independent “data vault”, which he said had been introduced in various European countries, and allowed for better regulation of online gambling companies. This vault would hold standardised gambling data, which gambling companies would be compelled to provide, and mechanisms to allow for thorough independent research on gambling harm and gambling safety.

There were “critical and obvious deficiencies” in the current system of monitoring and intervention for online gambling harm, which lay mainly with companies themselves, and relied on partial data and, sometimes, verbal assurances from a customer that they were betting safely, the coroner said.

Hudson’s case “should be a clear signal that we cannot leave monitoring and intervention solely in the hands of the betting companies”, Lawrie said.

Kaynak: The Guardian · Özgün metin İngilizcedir.