The Perth Casino Royal Commission has received several submissions documenting cases of gamblers being harassed and threatened by loan sharks at or near the Crown Perth Casino premises. The cases were detailed by Financial Counselling Australia (FCA), a Melbourne-based non-profit organisation that works to assist people who struggle with financial hardships. Several local gamblers sought help from the organisation after experiencing harassment and death threats from loan sharks they met on the casino floor.
Loan sharks are, in essence, unauthorized moneylenders who operate outside the law and target people struggling with financial difficulties. In one of the documented cases, a loan shark tried to arrange a meeting with a gambler in Kings Park at night after the gambler failed to pay their $10,000 debt.
In another case, a loan shark approached a losing gambler on the Crown Perth Casino floor and proposed to lend them $10,000 so they can recoup their losses. The gambler subsequently lost the borrowed money, which then led to death threats and harassment on behalf of the loan shark. The FCA suggested such unauthorised moneylenders operate with relative indemnity.
Loan Shaking Is among FCA’s Greatest Concerns
According to a financial counsellor working for the organisation, the gambling company did nothing to prevent these predatory practices despite the fact there were cameras all over the floor, allowing Crown’s personnel to see the loan sharks preying on vulnerable gamblers. Lauren Levin, the organisation’s Director of Policy and Campaigns, said this practice of illegal money lending was among the FCA’s greatest concerns.
Gambling operators are prohibited from extending credit to their patrons, so disregarding the loan-sharking practices is essentially “a form of willful blindness”, Levin says. During his hearing before the Perth Royal Commission, Brian Lee, general security and surveillance manager at Crown’s Perth venue, insisted the gambling operator had taken steps to prevent potential loan sharks from entering the premises.
In most cases, the suspected individuals faced a ban of at least two years before they could reach Mr Lee for revocation. Such bans often extended to more than two years, said the surveillance and security manager. Mr Lee was also asked about an individual who went under the alias Patron S. Patron S was a suspected loan shark and as such, was barred from entering Crown Perth back in 2020, Mr Lee said.
However, customers had raised concerns about the person in question eleven years earlier, complaining he was loan sharking in Crown Perth’s Pearl Room. The casino’s surveillance and security team itself raised approximately 18 notifications about Patron S and his suspicious behaviour between 2013 and 2015.
Casinos Should Be Included in the Nationwide Self-Exclusion Register, the FCA Says
The FCA submission to the Perth Casino Royal Commission called for the inclusion of casinos to the nationwide self-exclusion register whose launch is expected in 2022. Levin supports the idea and is also rooting for an overhaul of the present casino regulatory system in Australia. In her opinion, it lacks the tools, the regulation, and above all, the desire to handle such issues.
The country needs a nationwide gambling regulator and new laws that take consumer protection to heart. The presence of a single regulator would also eliminate the currently observed conflict of interest, Ms Levin concluded.
Centrecare, which operates the only problem gambling counselling service in Western Australia, reported it had witnessed a 25% increase in the number of individuals who sought assistance in 2020. During Centrecare’s submission to the inquiry, Director Tony Pietropiccolo emphasised the importance of raising public awareness to eliminate the stigma surrounding gambling addiction.
Crown currently has 2,500 video gaming machines, with problem players accounting for a considerable portion of the revenue they generate. Because of this, Mr Pietropiccolo is pushing for changes in said machines’ operation where gamblers are unable to exceed a preprogrammed maximum amount of money. Problem gambling is a community issue as it harms not only individuals but their family members as well, Mr Pietropiccolo said during the inquiry.
- Author
Olivia Cole
