Two pubs in Sydney, New South Wales (NSW)—the Colombian Hotel and the Gaslight Inn—were recently ordered by the state regulator, Liquor & Gaming NSW (LGNSW), to rearrange their gaming machines after it was discovered that the venues were skirting machine count limits by effectively connecting to each other as one big room.
Per state law, NSW hotels and bars may only house a total of 30 gaming machines per venue. Due to the fact that guests had equal access to both gaming areas, that effectively created one big venue, meaning that they were exposed to a total of 55 machines.
“The existence of a door between the two gaming rooms serves the sole purpose of facilitating patrons to move from one gaming room to the other. This circumvents the gaming machine limits imposed on hotels, which exist as a harm minimization measure,” Jane Lin, executive director of LGNSW, told Inside Asian Gaming.
According to the country’s Gaming Machines Act of 2001, gaming machines must be arranged in such a way that they cannot be viewed from outside the property, and that includes other licensed properties.
State regulators have the authority to order venues to reposition or remove machines if they feel that they are being promoted in a way that violates state law, as was the case here.
“The government and the community not only expect technical compliance with the state’s gambling laws, but for the spirit and intent of those laws to be met,” Lin told IAG.
“Liquor & Gaming NSW takes a zero-tolerance approach to venues that do not comply with gaming harm minimisation requirements. While the majority of venues do the right thing, those who breach these laws can expect to face the full force of the law,” she concluded.
