The Southern Cross Club says it will put 100 poker machines into storage under the government's new poker machine regime, which allows clubs to take machines off the floor without losing them.
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Club chief executive Ian Mackay revealed the plan on Wednesday at an inquiry into the clubs sector, where he and other clubs told Assembly members they were facing one of the most challenging times in their history.
The Canberra North Bowling Club in Turner and ACT Rugby Union Club in Barton manager Jeremy Wilcox and treasurer Andrew Sykes told the inquiry they had very few machines before merging the two clubs, when they had applied for 50 machines (on top of the 15 in Barton), as their only way of raising money to expand bowling.
The club wanted to sell the Barton site and had an offer of $2.5 million, but by the time it paid government charges to change its lease it would be left with just $700,000, they said, calling for a waiver of the charges.
"There is not this big queue or line up of people putting their wages in poker machines night in, night out. They're entertainment devices … [It's] time out. That's all these people are doing. They're not sitting there trying to gamble away their houses. I'm not in the business of trying to send people broke."
The Southern Cross Club group is the second biggest owner of machines in Canberra, with 680 in four venues. Mr Mackay said the club had 48 poker machines in storage, but under previous use-them-or-lose-them rules, those machines were to have gone back on the floor in September. Ths month, the government changed the law to allow clubs to store machines long term to prepare for a new cap on numbers in three years.
Mr Mackay said the club would now keep the 48 in storage, and take 52 more off the floor, including all 30 machines at its yacht club. The decision would put up to $500,000 in revenue at risk, but the group hoped to compensate by developing land in Woden. The decision was part economic, with Canberra "over-machined", and partly about reducing reliance on gambling. About 46 per cent of the Southern Cross Club's revenue is from poker machines, and Mr Mackay said he would feel more comfortable at 30 per cent.
In an earlier submission, Mr Mackay said there weren't enough poker-machine buyers to make the government's new trading scheme work. But on Wednesday he said there did appear to be a market from clubs "hoarding for the future" when they would have to give up poker machines to meet the cap.
While the Southern Cross Club did not want to buy and hoard, it planned to keep its 100 machines in storage in case they became worth a lot of money.
The club was heading for its second loss in three years and would have to cut funding for community groups by $100,000 this year. To compensate, it would introduce a rewards program, whereby members of community groups could raise money by spending money at the club – with $1 donated for every $10 spent.
Asked about evidence from senator Nick Xenophon on Tuesday that 40 per cent of poker machine revenue came from problem gamblers, Mr Mackay said he totally rejected the figure. He also rejected the suggestion that people could gamble up to $1200 an hour in a poker machine, saying "it's not doable", with one study suggesting an average hourly spend of $13.56, and his estimate of spending at his club at $18 an hour.
