Hunter gamblers lost a quarter of a billion dollars on the pokies in just six months last year, a jump of $50 million on pre-COVID levels.
Liquor and Gaming NSW figures show customers at licensed clubs across the region blew $149 million in the first half of 2022 while pub-goers lost $102 million.
The combined pub and club pokie profits compared with $157 million profits in the second half of 2021, a period during which COVID lockdowns forced people to stay at home for more than two months.
The $251 million pokie binge was up 25 per cent on pre-COVID times, when gamblers lost $201 million in the first half of 2019, and up 5 per cent on the $239 million lost in the half-year to June 2021.
The impact of poker machine losses has become a key issue in next month's state election after Premier Dominic Perrottet committed in November to introducing cashless gaming cards. The contentious package to make every poker machine in NSW cashless within five years passed a snap meeting of state cabinet on Sunday.
The move provoked an angry response from the clubs industry.
The Clubs NSW board fired chief executive Josh Landis last week after he claimed Mr Perrottet was influenced by his "conservative Catholic gut" on the issue.
Opposition leader Chris Minns has promised to cut the number of pokies in pubs and clubs and impose a mandatory cashless gaming trial for at least 500 of the state's 90,000 poker machines if Labor wins government.
Such a trial already exists at Wests Group's huge New Lambton club, which has the 13th most profitable array of poker machines in the state and has the largest pokie profits outside Sydney.
Wests launched the cashless gambling trial for up to 200 members in early October with poker machine manufacturer Aristocrat.
The trial was intended to last three months, but Wests chief executive Phil Gardner said this week that it was ongoing and researchers would publish the results when it was finished.
Newcastle local government area accounted for $86 million of the Hunter pokie losses in the first six months of last year and Lake Macquarie $67 million.
The poker machine debate has centred largely on the not-for-profit club industry, which, in the case of Wests, supports the Newcastle Knights rugby league team, amateur sporting clubs and a range of other community organisations with, in part, gambling profits.
But the Liquor and Gaming NSW figures show Hunter pubs rake in 40 per cent of the region's pokie profits.
Hunter licensed clubs owned a total of 5944 poker machines in June 2022, making a profit of $25,000 per machine in six months.
The region's pubs, which are limited to 30 per venue, owned 2231 pokies generating a profit of $45,000 per machine.
The number of pokies in Hunter pubs and clubs has dropped slightly over the past three years from 8583 in 2019 to 8175 in June 2022.
Belmont 16ft Sailing Club was the second most profitable poker machine club in the Hunter at June 2022, ranking 59th in the state out of 1028 venues, followed by Wallsend RSL (79th), Wests Cardiff (83rd), Wests Nelson Bay (93rd) and Wests Mayfield (102nd).
The Windsor Castle Hotel at East Maitland was the highest-ranking Hunter pub at 157th out of 1232.
Many of the state's leading gambling pubs and clubs are in western Sydney, where a host of marginal electorates could decide the March 25 election.
Hunter pubs and clubs paid more than $56 million in pokie taxes to the NSW government in the first half of 2022.
The state's pubs and clubs made $3.8 billion in profits from poker machines in the first half of 2022.
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