Granny loses all on pokies

By Karen Burge

Edna was over 80 when a friend took her to the casino for the first time. Within weeks she was going every day, playing the pokies until her purse was virtually empty.

Her son says that in under three years Edna has lost more than $70,000 in savings - the money withdrawn from her account in dozens of $500 lumps via casino cash machines.

Although she had always enjoyed a few bets on the horses or a Golden Kiwi over the years, Edna had never indulged in more than a mild flutter.

But complicated by the early stages of Alzheimer's, gambling addiction took over her life. It stripped her of financial security and has caused irreparable damage to her family relationships. Edna often has no recollection of being at the Auckland casino and denies to family that she has lost money gambling.

Despite their efforts to have her barred from the casino, present legislation does not sanction banning unless the gambler agrees.

Sky City says it wants greater powers to exclude problem gamblers and hopes the Gaming Law Reform Bill before Parliament will provide those.

But for Edna's family it will be too late. Her four children have watched her go from a doting grandmother and frugal budgeter to a woman who has no interests other than where her next bet is coming from.

As well as blowing her own savings she has spent $20,000 her children gave her as a nest egg when she was desperate and scared.

"She swore black and blue that she would never go back to the casino, and I accepted that, gullibly I suppose," says her son.

Within six weeks the $20,000 was gone, she had tried to raise a mortgage on her house, the bills had piled up, the house was a mess and she began to get physically violent towards her family.

The family have now taken control of Edna's finances and are supplementing her income and allocating her weekly spending money. Although Edna can no longer drive, her son has no doubts she is intent on finding a way back in to town to play the pokies.

"It just never entered my head when they built that casino in Auckland that it would affect my family."

The Compulsive Gambling Society says elderly people are vulnerable to problem gambling because they have time on their hands and are often lonely.

Once they lose their savings, superannuation and homes, they have no way of earning the money to start over, because of their age.

The society's research director, psychologist Sean Sullivan, says older people often feel foolish and embarrassed about their addiction.

Loneliness often drives older people to gamble.