New South Wales Promotes GambleAware Week in 2024
Every October, the Australian state of New South Wales runs its GambleAware Week initiative. This is a promotion designed to raise awareness of gambling and the harmful effects it can have on people and communities. For 2024, the theme is ‘Safer Gambling: Are You On Board?’
Australian State Launches Its Annual GambleAware Week Promotion
Every year, the Australian state of New South Wales runs a promotion called GambleAware Week. It takes place over the course of seven days in October, and its aim is simple: to promote safe and sensible gambling.
GambleAware Week is run by the state’s Office of Responsible Gambling. This year’s event runs from 21-27 October and has the tagline: ‘Safer Gambling: Are You on Board?’. It involves the promotion of a new peer support service.
This service is designed to make it easier for people needing help to reach those who have experienced gambling harm and are trained to discuss gambling-related matters with others. By sharing lived experiences, people can help others more effectively.
David Harris, the Minister for Gaming and Racing, said the following about the new service:
Embedding peer support workers into our gambling support services is a great step in our efforts to reduce gambling harm across NSW. We know that people with first-hand experience of gambling harm can offer a unique perspective and empathy to those seeking help.– David Harris, GambleAware’s Peer Support Service, GambleAware
There will be a total of seven workers trained to offer help. By early 2025, another four should join the ranks, making the service capable of assisting even more people.
GambleAware Week’s 2024 Primary Goal
While GambleAware Week 2024 tackles responsible gambling in general, it focuses on making sure those who choose to gamble do so more safely. This is so people can reduce the risks of harm right away.
Some of the safer gambling actions promoted during GambleAware Week include:
- Spending less than 2% of your take-home pay on gambling
- Gambling once per week
- Limiting yourself to two types of gambling
Further information about these and GambleAware Week can be found on the promotion’s official website. The site also offers a wealth of useful content and resources to help those negatively affected by gambling.
Getting Involved
During GambleAware Week, a range of activities and events will take place throughout New South Wales. There are dozens of talks, discussion groups, expositions, and workshops scheduled to be held in many different communities.
These are designed to reach as many people as possible. It’s also hoped that they’ll reach people who were going to start gambling but weren’t aware of the risks involved.
By hosting activities and events throughout the state, the organisers of GambleAware Week hope to achieve two things: encourage people to gamble responsibly and make people aware of the help and resources they can access.
