Melbourne to Macau: Gambling, Packer and Ho, ho, ho

Gambling, whatever form it takes - whether high-stakes baccarat in high rollers' rooms in casinos with international patronage or card games on blankets in the bush where Aboriginal men and women gamble social security benefits - brings with it three things: corruption, crime and calamity.

It depends on your point of view whether you see such social detriment being outweighed by social benefit. Jeff Kennett, former Premier of Victoria, justified the social benefit in The Age this week.

Perhaps Jeff ought to enter into discussion with the citizens of Macau and explain the social benefit of gambling to them. True, gambling seems to be the whole reason for the continuing existence of Macau. The former Portuguese colony, now handed over to China, was coveted by Europeans as a significant and strategic port. Whatever may have been significant in the European discovery and annexing of Macau, gambling is the significant factor now. And it is causing problems.

Macau has overtaken Las Vegas to become the world's gambling capital and is enjoying rapid growth, but violent clashes on international Labour Day indicate that the small southern Chinese city is socially ill. Read more here.

Macau now has 22 casinos which generated total gambling revenues of 56.2 billion patacas (US$ 7.2 billion) in 2006. In contrast, Las Vegas generated US$ 6.6 billion last year.

And an Australian is getting on the bandwagon.

Jamie Packer is Australia's richest man with a net worth of $5.5 billion. The Packer family has long interest and dominance in the Australian media. In recent years, however, Packer interests have entered the Casino business. The gambling business interest has increased over the years. The Packers have gone from being a media company with some gambling interests to a gambling company with media interests to the latest move which splits the business interests completely. This will expedite gambling (or - the word in gloss and spin circles - gaming) investments particularly those with the Ho family, who until 2002 held a 40 year gambling monopoly on Macau, and their company, Melco, with whom Packer is in partnership in opening Macau's 26th casino.

Crown Casino in Melbourne significantly impacts the city's economy, as Jeff Kennett says. Crown Macau, it is expected, will significantly impact Macau. The Crown will be Macau's 26th casino but will be Macau's very first six star hotel.

If, dear Reader, you are a concerned and ethical investor, you might like to note the financial institutions with whom the joint venturers are in cahoots:

• Australia and New Zealand Banking Group
• Bank of America Corp.
• Barclays Plc
• Deutsche Bank AG
• UBS AG

And, where does all this leave the mug punter - high roller or day tripper?

At Crown in Melbourne, there are reports that Crown could face fines of up to $1 million following an "underhanded" rule change that could increase its take from some gamblers by 40 per cent.

Meanwhile in Macau, because of an increase in gaming tables it is expected that revenue returning to gamblers will head downward. Up the tables and down the pay back. Mmmm....

Forbes says that in a recent research report, Morgan Stanley predicted that the average daily turnover per VIP gaming table would drop 22% to about $27,823 this year and dive another 50% to $13,608 a day in 2010. The average chip turnover per mass gaming table will plunge 21.7% this year to $3,266 a day and hit $1,912 in 2010, Morgan Stanley said. Mmmm....

And the locals....

Migrant workers (in Australia they are frequently referred to as "guest workers"), mainly from the PRC and Southeast Asia, made up approximately 10.3 percent of the work force. In May several thousand workers and union members marched in demand of more effective measures to prevent the hiring of illegal workers and to limit the number of imported workers (see section 6.b.). They often received less than local residents for performing the same job, lived in controlled dormitories, worked 10 to 12 hours per day, and owed large sums of money to labor-importing companies for purchasing their jobs. They had no collective bargaining rights and no legal recourse in the case of unfair dismissal. Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2006 : U.S. Department of State [Miss Eagle wonders how many work at casinos and will work at the Ho-Packer casinos?)

Ekklesia reports that the locals hit the streets again:

Thousands of people in the former Portuguese enclave in China took to the streets on 1 May 2007 to expressed dissatisfaction at poor governance in the city, citing corruption. They also noted unhappiness at sharp increases of imported labour and hikes in property prices. During the May Day clashes, 10 protesters were arrested and police fired shots into the air as a warning, accidentally injuring a passer-by.

Jamie Packer and Lawrence Ho might be happy. Their respective gambling addicted governments might be happy. Clearly not everyone is - neither in Macau nor Melbourne.

Open slather: government, business and guest workers

Business now knows that under the Howard Government there is open slather in the workplace. They can do what they like. American Express claims it can't get appropriately skilled workers in Australia and has to import them from Japan. Now Miss Eagle might be a bit naive -but she has done some Economics studies at University level and she has listened to and read all the free market stuff since Milton Friedman became a household name that some of us which we had never heard.

If there is scarcity of a good, the price goes higher. So Amex doesn't get what it wants in this country. The problem may be not that the skills are not here. The problem is more likely that Amex is not prepared to pay - not prepared to pay the market price. Amex needs to learn that if they want the free market they get the whole kit and kaboodle, like it or lump it. But no, they want out from free market provisions that they regard as onerous and want to get skilled labour on the cheap. And the Howard Government has the system that will help.

Then there are the horrific stories coming out as guest workers become a factor in this country: something Australians never thought they would see.

Was a time when Australians and Australian unions supported the White Australia Policy with - as one of its specific aims - the idea that if Asian labour came in wages and standards of living would be lowered. When Miss Eagle married in 1963 and purchased her bedroom suite it had stamped on it 'Made with European Labour'. Australians have resiled from that attitude and our country has welcomed people from all continents.

Miss Eagle also believes in moral causation or karma. We reap the consequences of our actions. Perhaps the advent of guest workers could be seen in this context. We used racism to protect our wages and standards of living now our racism is being challenged along with our wages and standards of living on our own soil by the very people we tried for 150 years to keep out.

But this is beyond karma. There is justice and equity for no one in the guest worker program.

Will Australians wake up to this and tell government and business to desist?

Australian values? Nuh, don't want any.

So the workforce is compliant, eh? Good old Australian values - which John Howard and his government want to promote - aren't good enough. They just won't cut the mustard with employers. We have to have guest workers instead of Aussie experience and Hanssen's are spruiking about Filipino workers - who they want plenty of - on PM yesterday. These workers have the Sword of Damocles hanging over their head - a one way trip back to the Philippines.

Hanssen's oughtn't to get too arrogant. Look at the Aussie men who thought they were getting an Asian doormat when they took a Filipina bride. Were they in for a big surprise! And look at all that people power they get into in the Philippines. And Miss Eagle, as a trade union official, once wondered about the Filipina brides 'invading' the hospitality industry. All she can say to employers who seek a compliant Filipino workforce, you could be in for a shock. Filipinos/Filipinas are prepared to take so much and no more. They are quite sensitive to inequity and injustice - and they are quite determined when their ire is roused.

The Prophetic Voice of Vinnie's

While I listened to the ABC's Religion Report on Wednesday 5 April, I thought I could hear Helen Coonan in the background marking down the ABC's Budget. Stephen Crittenden interviewed John Falzon, Operations Manager for one of Australia's biggest charities, the St Vincent de Paul Society. Falzon's interview was a tour de force and is worth listening to. For those of you who can't listen to it, or would like a permanent record, here it is. Fasten seat belts. Hold on to your seats.

The St Vincent de Paul Society says the Federal Government’s new breaching regime for people on welfare is immoral. Under the scheme, people who are breached but deemed to be extremely vulnerable, will be referred to the churches and charitable organisations to receive one-off payments of up to $650 to manage their cases.
Dr John Falzon is the National Operations Manager for the St Vincent de Paul Society.
John Falzon: Under the new Welfare to Work legislation, two major groups of people are going to be brought within the scope of the breaching regime. That’s people in receipt of parenting payments, especially single parents, but not exclusively, and also people with disabilities who are able to work more than 15 hours a week. Now when these people are breached, there are going to be some cases judged by Centrelink as being extremely vulnerable, and they are going to be referred to agencies that have taken up a contract to case manage the extremely vulnerable, and those agencies are going to give assistance in packages of up to $650 of government funds to the people who’ve been breached.What’s Vinnie’s position on this? Well, No.1 we consider the entire breaching regime to be unconscionable and immoral. It takes away dignity, it doesn’t offer hope, it doesn’t act as a mechanism for really enabling people to move from welfare to work. It punishes people who are already vulnerable, it deprives people of their human rights, of their dignity, of bread on the table for children in many cases.
Stephen Crittenden: And you’re not having any part of it.
John Falzon: Exactly. We’ve always held that position and as far as this idea of institutionalising charity and making people feel an even greater sense of humiliation in that even though the government is acknowledging that they’re going to be in a dangerous situation and is funding this period of crisis, it’s going to do so via a charity, to make people feel that the charity is being institutionalised and they’re being forced to go to a charity.
Stephen Crittenden: Yes, I don’t really understand what’s in it for the government. They aren’t really getting people off welfare, and even though the churches are looking after them, the government’s still going to be paying.
John Falzon: Yes, it’s more symbolic I think in this case. That’s what we really find unconscionable, that this is a return to some very old models of charity as being a means of really making people feel like they are to blame for their poverty. There’s a whole moral discourse involved here that we will have no part of. You know the wonderful educational theorist, Paulo Freire, and we really take his lead in Vinnie's, when he spoke very beautifully about needing to engage in a prophetic denunciation of the bad news, in order to engage in a prophetic annunciation of the good news. We denounce the breaching regime as bad news, there is no good news in any element of it. We do announce the good news that there is an alternative vision for Australia, and that’s one of our major concerns with this Welfare to Work legislation which some of our members refer to as Welfare to Work to Welfare - because in fact we don’t believe it’s going to have those sorts of positive outcomes that everyone would hope for. We believe that it lacks vision. Not only does it lack fairness but even from an economic rationalist point of view, it lacks strategic vision, and as the Book of Proverbs says, ‘Where there is no vision, the people perish’. Well where is the vision in pushing people who are vulnerable into that low end of the labour market without any adequate opportunity for skilling, for education, at a time when most commentators will acknowledge we’re facing a skills crisis, at a time when Australia can in fact have a competitive edge, by investing in education skills and innovation.
Stephen Crittenden: Presumably some of these people are still going to be coming to you for help, whether the government’s reimbursing you or not?
John Falzon: That’s true, absolutely, and Vinnie’s will never cease giving assistance to people who have been breached, and they will continue to come to us. We won’t be accepting government money to do that, we won’t be entering into a contract, but what we’ve always maintained is yes we will give the charitable assistance, we will be there as a charity because we consist of so many wonderful people who are giving up their time to do that, and because they believe in a fair go.
Stephen Crittenden: Doesn’t that let the government off the hook?
John Falzon: Well there’s the second part of the equation. We’ll give the charity to people but what we have always maintained is charity is fine, but what these people deserve is justice, and we’ll keep clamouring for that justice.
Stephen Crittenden: The Salvation Army says it will probably take up this proposal. The St Vincent de Paul Society says the breaching regime is immoral and you won’t have any part of it. Shouldn’t the churches be at one on this issue?
John Falzon: Well our position as far as – I’m not commenting on churches, but I will comment on agencies – we have taken the position quite rightly in my opinion, that we in no way wish to give any direction or call to other agencies as to how to conduct themselves. They must follow their own charters, their own rules, their own rationales for how to engage in this quite vexed social policy area.
Stephen Crittenden: But if you’re calling the government immoral, surely the implication is another church welfare agency who takes part in this immoral regime is participating in immorality if you like.
John Falzon: Well, as I said, we’re not commenting on the decisions of other agencies as to how they engage in this entire process, but for Vinnie’s our message is clear: in our rule as a matter of fact, it says where injustice, inequality, poverty, or exclusion are due to unjust economic, political or social structures, or to inadequate or unjust legislation, the society should speak out clearly against the situation, always with charity with the aim of contributing to and demanding improvements. For those people who might think that’s quite strongly worded, it’s not nearly as strongly worded as those words from the Prophet Isaiah, ‘Woe betide those who enact unjust laws and draft oppressive legislation depriving the poor of justice, robbing the weakest of my people of their rights, plundering the widow and despoiling the fatherless.’ That’s where we take our lead from, Stephen, we’re placed in a position by our members because of what they see every day in giving assistance to the people who come to us.
Stephen Crittenden: Let’s turn to a couple of other related welfare issues. Vinnie’s is also particularly concerned about what you’re describing as the nexus between the government’s Welfare to Work legislation and the new IR legislation.
John Falzon: Yes. Look, what we see is that the people who are going to be pushed by the Welfare to Work legislation into that low end of the labour market, are also the people conceivably, who will be subjected to compliance with Australian workplace agreements that potentially will not be family friendly, that will be deleterious to family life. We’ve actually received some legal advice to suggest that there may be a case whereby the provisions in the Welfare to Work legislation can contribute to coercion of sole parents to breach their duty of care to their children which is potentially a criminal offence.
Stephen Crittenden: But you’re also suggesting that the Welfare to Work legislation won’t just have the effect of pushing single mothers say back into the lower end of the workforce, it will also have the effect of pushing them on to individual contracts, which may be deleterious to them.
John Falzon: Conceivably, yes. We’re not in any way saying that that is necessarily going to be the case, but it is certainly on the cards as far as we can see, that that’s precisely where Australian Workplace agreements will be put in place, and who knows what kind of conditions will be removed from those working arrangements, particularly where children are involved.
Stephen Crittenden: OK, just finally, Dick Warburton and Peter Hendy, two Australian businessmen, have this week presented the Federal government with their review of Australia’s tax rates. And the Prime Minister has said that his first priority in this year’s budget is support for lower middle-income families. What is St Vincent de Paul Society saying about tax reform?
John Falzon: What we’re saying No.l is that the Treasurer is quite correct in citing the OECD figures that we’ve got the eighth lowest tax to GDP ratio, and that we’re the second-lowest spending amongst the OECD countries. We have always considered two major points as far as the debate on tax reform. 1. is that the effective marginal tax rates that affect precisely the people moving from Welfare to Work are incredibly high, up to the 70% mark and this acts as a major disincentive for people moving from Welfare to Work.
Stephen Crittenden: Labor’s Wayne Swan is saying this, too, this week.
John Falzon: Yes, quite right. Secondly though, we have always maintained that the far greater deficit in Australian society is not so much in terms of the need for tax cuts, it’s in terms of our under-investment particularly in social infrastructure, particularly in the costs that hit low income households, and middle income households in areas of education, health, transport, housing, child care, these are the sorts of costs that impact heavily because it’s a matter of shifting from the public purse to the private pocket. We would dearly love to see an intelligent and strategic investment in these areas of Australian society rather than putting a few dollars into people’s pockets, because this would have not only a great effect on those individual households, but as a whole, collectively as a nation, it would enable us to go forward and would stand in opposition to the narrow-minded punitive welfare reforms and IR reforms that we’ve seen.
Stephen Crittenden: John, thanks very much for being on the program.
John Falzon: Pleasure, Stephen.
Stephen Crittenden: You don’t often hear a Catholic who can quote the Bible. Dr John Falzon, the National Operations Manager for the St Vincent de Paul Society.