Online Casino Gambling Bill submission
I write from a Lived Experience perspective as Project Lead for the Gambling Harm Peer Support Workforce Initiative, delivered by Changing Minds in partnership with service providers and communities across Aotearoa. All members of our project team have Lived Experience, bringing first-hand insight into the real impacts of gambling harm and the importance of prevention.
Recent reporting from Hāpai te Hauora Māori has highlighted the use of fake success stories, stolen images, and culturally targeted advertising by online gambling operators or affiliates. These tactics prey on people’s vulnerability, exploit Māori identity, and manipulate moments of desperation, moments I and many others with Lived Experience know all too well.
The introduction of legalised online casino licences without strict harm prevention measures risks legitimising unethical operators. If this Bill is to move forward, it must protect people and communities first.
Ethical Licensing Requirements: Only license operators with a proven record of ethical behaviour, excluding those engaged in deceptive or culturally targeted advertising, if operators are from overseas, what experience/knowledge do we have of the operation.
Lived Experience in Oversight: Involve Lived Experience representatives in licensing decisions and compliance monitoring to ensure harm realities are front and centre.
Mandatory Harm Minimisation Tools: Enforce robust, non-negotiable player protections including deposit/loss limits, reality checks, and easily accessible self-exclusion, robust policing by DIA.
Cultural Safety Obligations: Require operators to work with Māori, Pacific, and other communities to develop culturally safe harm prevention strategies.
Sustainable Funding for Prevention & Peer Support: Dedicate a percentage of operator revenue to public education, Lived Experience-led training (in-person), and peer support workforce growth.
The harm from online gambling is not theoretical, it is lived, real, and preventable. This Bill is a chance to ensure that if online casinos operate in New Zealand, they do so under the highest possible ethical and cultural standards.
I oppose the Bill in its current form because it risks legitimising unethical online gambling operators who target vulnerable people with fake success stories, stolen images, and culturally targeted advertising, as seen in recent Hāpai te Hauora Māori reports.
If this Bill proceeds, it must include:
Strict ethical licensing rules excluding any operator involved in deceptive marketing.
Lived Experience voices in licensing decisions and harm prevention policy.
Mandatory harm minimisation tools and cultural safety obligations.
Overseas Licensing Risk
Many overseas online-casino operators have poor compliance records. If New Zealand issues them licences, the Bill must take a “trust, but verify” approach with strict, enforceable standards from day one, not wait three years for renewal.
Serious harm can occur in months. Licences should include regular audits, public reporting, and the ability to suspend or cancel immediately if standards are breached. From a Lived Experience perspective, we know unsafe practices can cause lasting damage quickly, prevention must be proactive, not reactive.
Please put people and communities before profit.
Ngā mihi nui
Colin Edwards
Project Lead for the Gambling Harm Peer Support Workforce Initiative