ClubsNSW CEO Josh Landis was sacked yesterday for suggesting Dominic Perrottet’s drive for cashless gaming cards was being driven by his “Catholic gut”.
The NSW premier didn’t miss when he appeared on Ben Fordham’s 2GB Breakfast show yesterday, calling the comments “inappropriate and offensive”.
By lunchtime, Landis had quickly capitulated, offering an unreserved public apology but by 4pm the ClubsNSW board had met and his sacking was announced.
When it comes to industry lobbyists, Landis is one of the most aggressive. This perhaps reflects his background as a lawyer and a staffer in the NSW Labor Right, and the training on political influencing he famously did in 2013 at the US National Rifle Association after helping tear down the Gillard-Wilkie mandatory pre-commitment reforms.
Five years ago, I was doing communications for The Alliance for Gambling Reform and Landis held the equivalent position at ClubsNSW, so I sent him this relatively innocuous email:
From: Stephen Mayne
Sent: Monday, 26 March 2018 6:35 PM
To: Josh Landis
Subject: quick query
Hi Josh,
I’m just doing some research on the bigger clubs in ClubsNSW.
Are you aware of any that have multiple venues without poker machines?
Kind regards
Stephen Mayne
On arriving at the ClubsNSW office the next morning, the former adviser to controversial NSW Labor treasurer Eric Roozendaal wasted little time starting some unpleasantries, as follows:
From: Josh Landis
Sent: Tuesday, 27 March 2018 8:58 AM
To: Stephen Mayne
Subject: RE: quick query
Dear Stephen
Thank you for your email. I’d be delighted to help you, as you will be to help us.
To that end, can you advise who has donated to the Alliance for Gambling Reform and how much money they donated in the last two financial years? How much did the estate of Mr Paul Bendat contribute? I’d like to know whether Alliance donors are offered a tax deduction for their donation.
Is Tim Costello a paid spokesman for the Alliance? If so, how much?
Recognising that, on behalf of the Alliance, Tim Costello declared the Tasmanian election “a referendum on gambling in Australia”, and the result was confirmed in South Australia, when will the Alliance cease operating and how many cents in the dollar can donors expect to be refunded on liquidation?
Josh Landis
Executive Manager – Public Affairs
ClubsNSW / ClubsAustralia
Within three hours, I politely returned serve at 11.52am on March 27 with the following email:
Hi Josh,
Paul Bendat wasn’t really involved with The Alliance and certainly nothing has flowed to The Alliance from his estate. The majority of our funding comes from Victorian local government so the tax deductibility is not relevant.
Tim Costello is a volunteer, so unpaid. I signed up with The Alliance in May 2016 as a part timer and thus far have received less than $50,000 in gross pay.
How much are you on?
Cheers, Stephen Mayne
Once again, Josh was quick out of the blocks and replied as follows at 12.38pm, finally dealing with the substantive inquiry but then ending with more gratuitous insults:
Stephen,
Thanks for your reply.
You should be aware that very few clubs in NSW are without gaming (approx 150 of 1300). I have several examples off the top of my head which are in club groups:
Camperdown Commons is a club without gaming machines. It sits on the old Camperdown Bowling Club site (which previously had gaming) and was extensively redeveloped following amalgamation with Canterbury-Hurlstone Park RSL, which is a fairly big gaming club.
West’s Bowling Club is a gaming-free venue in Newcastle that is part of the Wests Newcastle Group. Club Italia is part of the Mounties Group and it has no gaming machines. Belfield RSL is part of Canterbury Leagues Club Group and has no gaming.
We’re a not-for-profit industry and the salaries of our people reflect that.
How much has the Alliance spent campaigning for change in Tasmania, South Australia and NSW? Has the Alliance formally notified its Victorian Local Govt funders how much of the annual budget was spent outside of Victoria?
Seeing as Mr Costello has a tendency to make hyperbolic and factually inaccurate statements, when will you be replacing him as the main spokesperson?
Josh
Five years later and Tim Costello is still doing a great job fighting the pokies, and the window of opportunity has suddenly opened right up in the ClubsNSW heartland. Its national subsidiary Clubs Australia is used to completely owning NSW politics and sending its fixers off to put out fires in other states, but it feels different this time.
Landis was promoted from the pokie club spin doctor role to the top job when the long-serving ClubsNSW CEO Anthony Ball resigned in 2020 to head up government and stakeholder relations at pokies giant Aristocrat Leisure.
Ball can also be quite threatening and insulting in his communications. When former senator and long-time gambling reform advocate Nick Xenophon fell short in his bid to become a big player in the South Australian Parliament, Ball sent him an unsolicited text at 11.55pm on 17 March 2018 which simply said:
“Sorry Nick. We will kill you all off.”
I raised this conduct with the Aristocrat board during the recent interview process for the coming contested board election at the February 24 AGM and suggested it dissociates from Ball. So far, it is standing by its man, but using the word “kill” in communications with a senior politician is not something which would be tolerated at many companies.
In the end, these ClubsNSW directors showed some spine sacking Landis yesterday and if these Aristocrat directors were managing their reputational risks, they would be putting as much distance between their $22 billion company and NRA-trained ClubsNSW heavies as possible.
It truly is remarkable that NSW has 90,000 pokies spread across 2600 pubs and clubs, which annually drain about $7 billion a year from the community. They also aid and abet widespread criminal money laundering through the washing of dirty cash into Aristocrat machines which can still accept up to $10,000 through their note acceptors in a single session before you need to actually place a bet.
Eliminating cash entirely might reduce annual pokies losses to perhaps $6 billion, but if you believe journalists such as The Daily Telegraph’s rugby league writer Phil Rothfield, such a move “could have a devastating effect” on clubs such as Canterbury-Bankstown.
Most NRL clubs are independently profitable without relying on their associated suburban casinos, but an unnamed Canterbury-Bankstown director told Rothfield the anti-money laundering card “could cripple us”.
Last year the Canterbury League Club made an $11 million profit and gave the NRL club $5.8 million. Rothfield confidently asserted: “That money won’t be there in future years with these new gaming cards.”
As Michael Pascoe also detailed in this excellent piece in The New Daily unpicking ClubsNSW use of country newspapers to criticise unfriendly politicians, it is surprising how many media outlets still fall for ClubsNSW’s hollow talking points.
Now that Landis is gone, the ClubsNSW board has an opportunity to completely overhaul its approach, starting by pulling this old school website which urges citizens to email their local NSW state MP to campaign against an anti-money laundering card.
