Less money being lost on the pokies

The amount of money being lost gambling on Dunedin poker machines has decreased during the past four years, with Mosgiel, the central city and the suburbs of City Rise home to the venues where players are most likely to lose their cash.

New Zealand Problem Gambling Institute quarterly figures, highlighting the locations and money spent on Dunedin poker machines for the first three months of this year, show Mosgiel - in gambling terms - is home to the biggest losers.

• Tough ordeal fighting a losing battle 

Problem Gambling Foundation of New Zealand spokesman Graham Aitken said different "clusters" of poker machines were evident around pubs and clubs in Dunedin.

The money being lost on pokies has dropped during the past four years, from more than $23 million for the 12 months to March 2008, to $18,773,934 for the year to this March, Mr Aitken said.

The central city has the largest number of venues housing poker machines - nine - including the Dunedin Casino, which boosts the number of individual machines for the "suburb" to 128.

Individual gaming machines in the centre city hauled in about $9043 a machine - a total of $1,203,666 for the area during January, February and March this year.

Mosgiel gambling machines secured the dubious distinction of being the most lucrative earners, the township's five venues and 63 machines Bringing in an average of $9621 a poker machine.

Dunedin Problem Gambling Foundation counsellor Thomas Moore said pokies received much press about the "public good" they provided via the payment of taxes and grants given to worthwhile community organisations.

However, in his experience poker machines showed no identifiable recreational good for the individual player and were often viewed as antisocial.

Mr Aitken said some good work was being done to highlight problem gambling in Dunedin, the most recent being a case study started by Otago Polytechnic occupational therapy students into the prevalence of access to poker machines for students in North Dunedin.

Mr Moore said students regularly sought help with gambling problems.

Student problem gamblers fitted an "almost exclusive" stereotype, of typically being high-achieving white males, who came from successful school and sporting backgrounds.

"It is hard to know the complete extent of problem gambling among the student population, because many of them are at a time of their life when they are still exploring a change in their behaviour from adolescent to adult," Mr Moore said.

Students made up a "regular" proportion of his case workload.

Confronting a gambling problem was often about facing up to an individual personality foible, often at a time young people lacked the maturity to do so, Mr Moore said.

"Often, gambling issues start when people don't have the personality development to recognise what's happening," he said.

There was always the potential for gamblers to develop "incremental dishonesty", which could lead to criminal behaviour as they sourced money to fund the habit, Mr Moore said.

Yesterday was national Gamble-free Day.