Labor’s response to gambling harm report looks halfhearted

May 16, 2026 — 3:00am

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This week the Victorian Coroners Court has been hearing the story of one family devastated by their son’s suicide.

Kyle Hudson was encouraged by online betting sites to come out and play – almost 500 times.

And play he did. The court heard that his bets between 2017 and 2021 totalled $900,000, including deposits of more than $406,000.

Was there a limit to how far Kyle could go? Well, one of the online sports betting companies he had an account with was bet365 (“we’re putting the power in your hands”), and they did allow Kyle to set a limit – the monthly deposit ceiling was $1 million.

But his spending was monitored, surely? Another gambling giant, Sportsbet, told the court that Kyle’s spending had triggered its internal alert system on average once every six weeks, and it contacted him directly by email or phone over his behaviour 37 times. Sarah Rizzo, director of customer operations at the company, provided evidence that many of these internal alerts were reviewed manually by staff, who determined “no further action” was required.

At another betting company, Entain (which operates Ladbrokes and Neds in Australia), Kyle was blacklisted – not out of concern for his safety, but for fear that he was gaming the........

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