February 11, 2023 — 5.30am
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Negotiating the final terms of his legal settlement with ClubsNSW this week, Troy Stolz had an argument with his wife. She wanted to take what was on the table, he was stuck on a principle.
It had been more than three years since Stolz filed legal action against his former employer and triggered a cascade of counter-litigation. He had lost his house, many friends and very nearly his marriage over his determination not to let the powerful lobby group win. His eldest daughter was no longer talking to him, and he had not seen his granddaughter in two years. Last year he was diagnosed with terminal cancer.
“Tell them to stick it up their arse,” he shouted. “I won’t sign it. If you don’t like it, get a divorce.”
He spent that night in the caravan with his two dogs. On Tuesday morning, he signed.
Two days earlier, Dominic Perrottet settled another deal that had been the subject of tortuous negotiations when cabinet unanimously approved his gambling reforms. They included a plan to make all poker machines cashless by 2028, thereby ending their utility for money launderers, with self-determined betting caps to limit the damage to players who could not control their own impulses.
It was a watershed moment in the highly emotional and sometimes hysterical posturing that has characterised the debate over cashless gaming technology over the last six months. Now it was no longer the...
The Department of the Attorney General says the man claiming to be the state’s chief technology officer at national conferences and on online platforms is not affiliated with the state of Hawaii a...