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It is a serious moral problem to make a promise and then wilfully break it, as Prime Minister Julia Gillard has done, Bishop Philip Huggins said last month.
Bishop Huggins, who is Chair of the Melbourne Anglican Social Responsibilities Committee and Bishop of the North Western Region of the Diocese, said in a media statement on 23 January that the Prime Minister “did not just break her promise to Mr Wilkie”. “She broke it with the coalition of groups who then lent their support to these reforms. She broke it too with those problem gamblers who bravely spoke in public about their plight, hoping their support of the reforms might give some meaning to their suffering and that of their families.”
He said the governing body of the Anglican Church in Melbourne, the Diocesan Synod, representing more than 200 Parishes, plus welfare and educational bodies, also backed the gambling reforms last October. “Along with other Church and community groups, we saw these reforms as sensible proposals to assist problem gamblers manage their addiction and put them on the path to healing and freedom.”
He added: “Delivering her promise to Mr Wilkie was always going to be difficult for the Prime Minister. The Clubs and Casinos were always going to campaign against it, making backbenchers and other Independents anxious.
“But there is a deeper issue. When individuals and community organisations co-operate with Governments of the day for needed reforms, our civil society grows stronger. But when confidence in a Government’s trustworthiness is shaken by broken promises, people withdraw and civil society is depleted.
“At its extreme, we see this now in the bitterness of citizens towards their Government in parts of Europe and
the Middle East.
“For these reasons of moral and political integrity, and for the sake of vulnerable problem gamblers, the Prime Minister is urged to return to her original agreement with Mr Wilkie. Let strong public opinion then encourage the Parliament to endorse these reforms.”
In a letter to The Age on 23 January, the Anglican representative on the Victorian Interchurch Gambling Taskforce, Fr Graeme Reynolds lamented that the Prime Minister and others in the ALP, had “given in to the power of the gambling lobby, which is content to make tens of millions of dollars from addicts.”
Fr Reynolds, who is also the General Manager, Parish Partnerships and Community Development for Anglicare Victoria, added, “As one who is involved with people suffering the consequences of addictions, I despair of anything realistic happening to relieve this suffering.”
An earlier media statement released by Bishop Huggins on 16 January affirming support for a mandatory pre-commitment on pokies was criticised in The Age by Father James Grant, priest in charge of the parish of Jika Jika in Preston and part-time Chaplain at Crown Casino. He was reported as saying that because the church did not “have a relationship with the gambling industry” or employ specialist gambling chaplains this meant the church had failed to understand the issues faced by problem gamblers and led it to endorse a simplistic solution.
Bishop Huggins is reported to have said in response that Anglican agencies such as the Brotherhood of St Laurence employed hundreds of general addiction specialists to help people, and that while counselling was crucial, mandatory pre-commitment allowed addicts to set a limit before the addiction took hold.
General Manager of Chaplaincy Services at the Brotherhood of St Laurence, Father Jeff O’Hare told TMA: “The Brotherhood mostly deals with how this social disease manifests itself in the long term, and diminishes the lives of the disadvantaged and vulnerable in our society who might go looking for a solution and a quick win in dire times. The effect on individuals and families is heart breaking. It isn’t about a quick and affable flutter, it is often addictive, and destructive to the individual and the many involved in an individual’s life.”
Pokies can be addictive and destructive.