'Alarming': One In Three Aussie Children Gambling

About one in 3 Aussie kids are the dice on their futures, losing more than $18 million to gambling each year.


The newest findings launched by think tank the Australia Institute reveal 30 per cent of 12 to 17-year-olds gamble, with the figure spiralling to nearly half of 18 to 19-year-olds.


That's 600,000 teenagers gambling each year.


Gambling reform supporters say it's the result of an intentional attempt by the gaming market to groom children to bet from a really young age.


"There is proof that the gambling industry targets kids as young as 14 years of ages through social networks, advising them to download gambling advertisements, and the saturation of gambling advertisements around our significant football codes is likewise tempting children to bet," Alliance for Gambling Reform president Martin Thomas stated.


"It is both worrying and terrible to comprehend that the variety of teens gambling under the legal age would fill the MCG 6 times over."


The alliance is calling on all prospects in the upcoming federal election to commit to the recommendations made following the Murphy query into online gaming, chaired by the late Labor MP Peta Murphy.


The query's 2023 report found a "torrent" of advertising and simulated gambling through video games was grooming children to wager and encouraging riskier behaviour.


It advised a total phase-out of all betting marketing over 3 years.


Despite the review being unanimously backed across parliament with no dissenting remarks, Labor has actually dragged its feet on betting reform despite increasing pressure to ban betting ads.


Australians already rack up the world's highest gambling losses, positioning $244.3 billion in bets every year.


Rates of betting have actually increased because 2019 and typical annual losses increased from nearly $2000 per individual to about $2500, according to the Australian Institute report.


The nation's overall gambling losses at $31.5 billion rivals the entire Northern Territory economy and is greater than the $21 billion lost to betting in all of Las Vegas, the report included.