Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act 2009 (Application to Casinos) Amendment Bill

In the first part of my speech I was outlining the fact that casinos benefit from theft, fraud, and money-laundering crimes, and I was making the case that this bill would reduce the level of crime associated with casinos by introducing disincentives. When there is no disincentive, there is no will to actively monitor the gambling activity of people who spend large sums of money.

Casinos make millions—absolute millions—from the proceeds of crime that are being gambled there, and there is no incentive to reduce crime, because it will affect their profit margins. I listed several examples of casinos making millions of dollars from people convicted of theft and fraud, and explained that small businesses, not-for-profit organisations, and family members are being defrauded of huge sums of money—money that, essentially, the casinos get to keep.

This bill says that if a casino knows, and can reasonably know, that vast sums of money are being spent on their premises, then they need to do something more than just sit back and take the profits. They need to do something about it. And they do know when it is happening. That is what VIP cards are. That is what loyalty cards are. They track what casinos are doing. The winners of casino crime are the casinos. This bill says that the money should go back to those who have lost that money. Thank you.

This bill, the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act 2009 (Application to Casinos) Amendment Bill, is a particularly bad piece of legislation. What the Green Party is trying to do is fix a problem that does not exist. I get that Green members do not like casinos. I think they do not like them because people have a choice to go there and have fun, should they want to. The only part of our legislation around our police force that the Greens seem to be in favour of is when you get the fun police out to look at normal New Zealanders who are choosing to have fun in their recreational time, and the Greens want to stop this. You see, this bill covers only casinos. What the Greens are saying is that criminals who may gain revenue for themselves through illegal actions go only to casinos to use that revenue, and I would challenge that. If the author of this bill really was concerned about this issue, the bill would include New Zealand Lotto, and it would include the TAB, and it would include many other places that non - law-abiding citizens—criminals—can go to spend their ill-gotten gains.

This is nothing worse than political grandstanding of the very worst type—in fact, the worst type of political grandstanding I have seen since I came to this House 4 years ago. I believe that the author of this bill is wasting the House’s time with this legislation. There are already things that deal with this, and they deal with it for all companies in New Zealand that are involved with any type of financial transaction. Of course, the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act, an Act that went in to place in 2009, already deals with this. Therefore, casinos are covered by that piece of legislation. Casinos themselves have special legislation in New Zealand around host responsibility—a host responsibility programme. This is not them choosing to do this by themselves. Actually, the host responsibility programme comes about because the current legislation that provides for casino licences demands it. I believe that casinos take this extremely seriously, because if they do not, they put their licence to operate a casino at risk in this country.

We also have the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act, which went through the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee in the last term of Parliament, when I was a member of that committee. That piece of legislation does a number of things. It says to all businesses in New Zealand that are involved with financial transactions, which therefore includes casinos, that when there is activity that is deemed to be unusual or different or over a certain threshold—$6,000 in some cases; $10,000 in others—they must keep records, they must get extra information from the person conducting that transaction, and they must be assured that the funds that are being used are being done so appropriately and have not been gained through terrorism or through money-laundering or through ill-gotten gains. So already we have legislation in place to cover this.

I come back to what I said earlier. The Green Party does not like casinos because everyday New Zealanders have the choice to go there and enjoy themselves. We will be voting against this legislation because it adds absolutely nothing at all. It does not fix any problem at all. If the Green Party was serious about this, it actually would have spent some time researching the issue and coming forward with things that actually might help, rather than saying that it is going to beat up on an industry in New Zealand that this House has said is legitimate and has a right to be here, that employs so many thousands of New Zealanders up and down the country, that plays an important part in our economy, and that has safeguards placed upon it. This bill does absolutely nothing at all, and I will be very happy to vote against it shortly. Thank you.

I want to thank all of those parties and members who have spoken in support of this Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act 2009 (Application to Casinos) Amendment Bill. We very much appreciate that commitment to protecting New Zealand families, communities, and New Zealand businesses. I am shocked by the level of ignorance displayed by the National Party members who have spoken on this bill, including the last contribution just made by Todd McClay. It is certainly true that there has been some anti-terrorism and anti - money-laundering legislation that has been passed and does come into force next year, I think. That legislation does put some parameters around trying to stem money-laundering, in particular, for which casinos are very well-known. What that legislation does not do—and, in fact, what no legislation yet does—is require casinos to forfeit the profits that they make from money that is spent in their establishments that has been stolen. There is no means in New Zealand law as yet that requires the casinos to return money to the businesses, the communities, and the individuals from whom money has been stolen for the purposes of gambling at casinos.

There is a great gap in the law that means that families and communities and businesses are paying for the profits of casinos and have no way of having that money returned. My bill will close that gap in the law. My bill will make sure that families and communities and businesses have the chance to recover at least some of the money that was stolen from them for the purposes of gambling. By closing that gap my bill will make the casinos subject to the same kind of forfeiture regime that every other New Zealander in this country is subject to. There is not a single New Zealand citizen who is entitled to keep the profits of crime. That is what the law currently says. Like it or not, casinos are themselves in receipt every day—every day—of some form of money that has been stolen to feed a gambling habit. Casinos, too, should be subject to the same laws and requirements as the citizens of New Zealand.

There are a number of cases that I want to talk about so that people in this Chamber, particularly those who have been blind so far to the effects of problem gambling, can understand who is being affected. These are cases from just the last 2 years. November 2012: a 36-year-old finance officer at a nursery convicted of stealing $455,000 from his employer, which he used to visit casinos. October 2012: a 64-year-old Feilding payroll clerk convicted of stealing $260,000 from her employer because she had a $700-a-day gambling addiction. October 2012: a 61-year-old accounts manager at the University of Otago sentenced for stealing $230,000 from his employer. He stole to support his gambling addiction. June 2012: a 50-year-old finance officer employed by a marae stole $330,000 from her employer. She had worked there for 17 years and used her employer’s credit card at the casino bank to withdraw money to feed her gambling addiction. June 2012: a 33-year-old sales assistant employed by a Wellington company stole $88,000 worth of copper piping to sell in order to feed his gambling habit. December 2011: an Upper Hutt property manager convicted of stealing $54,000 from his employer to fuel his gambling addiction.

These are just some of the cases that we see in this country, month after month, year after year, where businesses and community organisations are having money stolen. It is being spent at the casino and in other gambling places, and that casino never needs to return any of that money either to the Crown or to the people from whom it was stolen. That, surely, is unfair—that, surely, is unfair. Those who have had money stolen from them, and where that money has been forfeited by the Crown under the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act, can apply to have that money returned, so it is possible to have that money returned to them. That is what this bill does. It is an important legislative gap that needs to be filled, and it is justified because families and communities and businesses should not have to feed casino profits day after day after day. Thank you.