Earlier this year, the New Zealand gaming industry was shocked to discovered that the Problem Gambling Foundation would lose its government funding. Lawmakers decided to allocate the problem gambling services budget to the Salvation Army, and now the foundation is fighting back in court. According to Radio NZ, the Problem Gambling Foundation will appear in court on September 22 to challenge the loss of its funding.
The group is confident in its ability to deliver a high-quality of service to problem gamblers across the country, and does not believe that the Salvation Army should receive the majority of problem gambling funding from the government.
"We think that we deliver very, very high quality services and if the process that we've been through didn't recognise that and didn't recognise that we've been doing that well and delivering on our contract for 25 years, then there's something wrong with the process,” says Graeme Ramsay, chief executive of the Problem Gambling Foundation.
When the funding for the program was cut, Ramsay says that the ministry informed him the decision was due to neither price nor performance. So, the group has not been given a solid reason was to why it will receive significantly less funding.
Rumours state that the government has pulled the funding because the Problem Gambling Foundation openly denounced the SkyCity convention centre deal while the Salvation Army supported it. This is certainly a valid observation, and we wonder if the government will be able to dispute it in court. This is going to be quite an interesting court case, and we are eager to see how the High Court rules.
The most important thing is that problem gamblers in New Zealand continue to receive quality care and counselling.
We will keep you updated with further developments.
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