Council candidate chosen to lead gambling campaign

Central Coast Greens council candidate Ms Kate da Costa has been chosen to lead the NSW campaign for the Alliance for Gambling Reform.

A Umina resident said local councils did not have any say over how many poker machines were operating in their local government area.

"The Alliance for Gambling Reform grew out of Victoria and lots of Victorian Councils are members but there was no coordination so in 2014 a national movement was established," Ms da Costa said.

"We have now decided to move the campaign into NSW where half the pokies in Australia are located," she said.

She said she believed the new Central Coast local government area would be one of the campaign's key targets for the campaign which would focus on poker machine numbers and the enormity of poker machine losses.

"It matches with the socio-economic profile of the region and it is a stress indicator," she said.

Ms da Costa spoke with Peninsula News on her fourth day in the job with the Alliance and said she did not yet have local figures.

"In the new Northern Beaches LGA $465,000 is lost on poker machines each day; that is $170 million per year.

"I expect the figures will be similar in our own area," she said.

Ms da Costa said she had also been elected to the executive of the NSW Nature Conservation Council.

She said she looked forward to being a voice for the local area.

SOURCE:

Interview, 9 Nov 2017

Kate da Costa, Alliance for Gambling Reform

Reporter: Jackie Pearson