If officials came back to him and said geo-blocking the overseas sites was the best option, McAnulty said he was happy to put it forward to Cabinet for consideration. Two, we don't know what the anti-money laundering laws/processes are like and three, every dollar that's spent with them isn't coming back to New Zealand sports and racing.' 'It's a worry for me because one, harm minimisation isn't a priority when it should be. The minister said there was a bigger piece of work that needed to be done about offshore providers that some Kiwis accessed for gambling. McAnulty said $5m would be used to introduce facial recognition technology at TAB outlets and he believed it was a good use of the money.

Having structures in place that one, identify unhealthy behaviour, identify those who have exhibited that before and preventing them from betting, but also not having predatory advertising like we see overseas that encourages those that shouldn't be gambling to gamble money they don't have. Problem gambling is very bad and we need to prevent that. 'In my mind, and many others, it's quite easy to see that gambling in itself isn't bad. He had negotiated with the TAB to see some of that lump sum put into harm mitigation. It had guaranteed $150m over the next five years as well as a $150m lump sum to be distributed to New Zealand sports and racing. McAnulty said Entain would get 50 percent of profits made. 'The product will be better, the return for New Zealand racing will be better, far superior to anything the TAB could do by themselves and it doesn't cost the taxpayer so it seemed like a pretty good deal to me.' McAnulty said the return for New Zealand racing would increase.

Tab gambling