The Synod of the Diocese of Sydney has officially supported efforts in Federal Parliament to reduce the impact and incidence of problem gambling.
A motion, moved by the Canon Sandy Grant, the Senior minister at St Michael’s Cathedral in Wollongong, also calls on the NSW Government to reduce its reliance on taxation on gambling.
Synod was told there are between 80,000 – 160,000 problem gamblers in Australia, with poker machine users disproportionately represented among them.
The motion said that another 230,000 – 350,000 people vulnerable to problem gambling.
In the Presidential Address which opened the Synod, Archbishop Peter Jensen said “The penetration of the gambling culture into sport and the media bodes ill for the future of sport in this country”.
He commended the Gillard government for its “moral leadership about gambling addiction”.
Likewise, the Synod motion “endorses efforts being proposed in Australia's Federal Parliament to reduce the impact and incidence of problem gambling, for example, by the introduction of a compulsory pre-commitment system for poker machine use.”
It also points people to Social Issues Executive Briefings 33 and 91 for “sound biblical arguments for why gambling is both wrong for Christian believers and damaging to our community”.
