The Greens say Labor’s excuse for caving-in to the gambling lobby is shifty and they will test the Government with a Senate vote to ban gambling advertising in line with the Peta Murphy Inquiry recommendations. 

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young is spokesperson for Communications and Manager of Greens Business in the Senate:

“Don’t buy Bill Shorten’s lie. Labor have caved in to the gambling lobby and they are scraping around for an excuse. The gambling lobby have had their claws in both the Labor and Liberal Party for far too long. 

“We can support public interest journalism in this country without sucking the life and happiness out of Australian families, forcing gambling addicts to pay the price. The Prime Minister of this country Anthony Albanese needs to stand up to the gambling lobby.

“Experts have told us we need to ban gambling advertising, like tobacco ads, and Labor will be tested on this question in the Senate when Greens amendments for a full gambling ad ban in line with the Peta Murphy recommendations are voted on.

“We should be banning gambling advertising, taxing the big tech corporations and funding public interest journalism. Gambling addiction is not the solution for public interest journalism. 

“It is incredible that only two months ago the Albanese government threw free to air broadcasters under the bus by locking sport behind the paywalls of the global streamers with their anti-siphoning laws. Now, suddenly are using Free TV as an excuse to cave-in to the gambling lobby. Labor caved to the pressure of the big tech companies like Kayo and Amazon, now they are caving to the gambling lobby.

“This is not about championing Free TV or quality journalism, this is about Labor caving to vested interests instead of standing up for the public interest.”