Luke is certainly entitled to his opinion and welcome to have it. His input was very valuable at the hearing.

The angle I have taken through the AOPA is that we are not backing any particular site or structure - just the principle that we should allow online poker in Australia

Questions about what site or what location are all matters that we are a long way away from. To be honest they are irrelevant unless we get the first part over the line and have poker allowed.

The AOPA position has always been to advocate legislative change that allows sites to be licensed in this country.

Once that change is in we will worry about the nitty gritty.

Anything else at the moment is just white noise.

his intention would be to ultimately be the only product available to Australians? seems like a good end game for a company? who knows, but these two posts were made when PAP was suspended, they never mentioned anything from these posts prior to their suspension? So in that case motives can be cloudy.







http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...&postcount=805

when you dont know the full story to this its quite easy to jump to conclusions.

Thanks the the posts Swoop, Joey, 7deuc3. Appreciate the time you took to write your posts.

7deuc3, your post has cleared a lot up for me, after reading PAP's posts I understand his standpoint a bit more. From his posts itt some of us seemed to get a different idea.

Luke has every right to make his case about how he wants to build his 5 billion dollar poker site and list it on the ASX.

But claiming to know incomes and taxes owed?
Offering assistance to help tax them?? Obviously he has a motive to squeeze out any competition.
From most peoples perspective, he seems like he is just using the opportunity in an attempt to become the sole Australian Poker site.

All the good points will likely get overlooked because it comes across as a sales pitch.

Luke can lobby for whatever he wants as an individual and if he wants to clarify his current position beyond his public statements that's entirely up to him. The aopa and poker community myself included obviously won't support any legislation giving a monopoly to any company be that pap stars crown or whatever else. Monopolies are bad for players. Obviously an open marketplace where any site that is willing to meet licensing conditions can offer poker to Australians is ideal and Luke's site and any other site servicing the Australian market can compete on their merits for customers and may the best site gain the biggest market share etc

Well said Swoop, agreed

If it becomes only aussie sites that can obtain legisltation and offer poker to aussies, i know of one place that could potentially dominate lukes site, just saying, luke

also after reading your graphs i now understand the $75 per hour was from a 10x problem gambler, it wasn't clear in the transcript though.

Anyway, i think joey, swoop and all involved including all the speakers in our favour have done a great job so I do appreciate it.

I am slightly dissapointed that some aussie pros are not voicing there opinions on this issue though, whether that be for possible back paying taxes or they have enough enough money to play with vpns still on stars like many us still do and travel the live circuit i guess. But it is disappointing that the top players are just avoiding this.

Another great effort Joey

http://www.smh.com.au/business/onlin...01-gxmxyy.html

It makes my skin crawl that the discredited rubbish peddled by the Australian Institute of Family Studies and others gets cited in the article as some kind of valid counter argument.

That Salvation army submission is appalling.

where do they pull these statements and statistics from? before poker i was a problem gambler, i was blowing a few k' a day for a number of weeks, putting in money i didnt want to put in, stuck in a trance like state, poker taught me and saved me from continuing the path of a problem gambler, i may donk around on the felts occasionally but i havnt gambled on any casino games, no races and no sports but most importantly POKIES in over 5 years!

has anyone on this forum ever been a data point for any statistical gathering on Poker and problem gambling etc? I'd say the chances are slim?

Leyonhjelm ripped the salvos testimony apart if u want to read the transcript from the hearing it's linked earlier in thread

Ugh so little of what I actually said to him made it into the paper.

Typical Fairfax...

Hey guys,

Joey, I'm afraid there's still no credit for Poker Asia Pacific but plenty for the "reputable" offshore guys in your SMH article, submission and speech. It appears like you're some sort of figurehead now for Australian Online Poker but forgot to mention Poker Asia Pacific at all.

Here's Poker Asia Pacific's original change.org petition from August 2016 after the first Australian site was shut down by the AFP and others allowed to continue to operate - not a word about that from you. Alliance?

https://www.change.org/p/help-us-reg...r-in-australia

Joey Del Duca, from out of the blue and founder of AOPA, made this petition on change.org in December 2016 and it was the first post on his newly created Facebook page: Australian Online Poker Alliance.

https://www.change.org/p/keep-online...edium=copylink

They are amazingly similar, right down to the heading and image used.

Joey told me that he didn't even know about Poker Asia Pacific's petition. He said he heard about PAP's petition one month after he created it. Really?

If it is true, it is not very well informed of him, for a figurehead, however, he told me; "he just saw something", and then had the idea to make his own petition on change.org and subsequent FB page.

It is precisely how it was done by Poker Asia Pacific on its Facebook page 3 months prior.

Thankfully, the senators will be the judge on this.

I do admit Joey has helped the cause, however, a little credit where credit is due would have been appreciated...

Thanks guys.

that's typical of all media outlets now.

you deserve no credit Luke, you have been in this from day 1 for 1 reason that was sole personal gain. So don't try to chime and claim to be the savior because you made a few posts 3 months prior to Joey, who on his own time and out of his own pocket set up an union that facilitated the community with a voice. Just go back under the rock you climbed out of a week ago until the decision is handed down you delusional ****.

It's a shame Fairfax had to go all 'fair and balanced' and try and give 'equal time' to 'the opposing side of the argument' without fact checking any of what they actually had to say. It's like having to give equal time to the 1% of scientists or whatever that disagree with the consensus that global warming is a thing in every article, but not bothering to mention that their study was funded by Exxon-Mobil or whatever.

Overall the article gives us visibility which is good, but isn't overly good or bad imo

Hi Luke,

I agree that you have had some unfair grief here and maybe you were out in front before everyone else. Me? I've been banging on in the UK for better poker regulation for many years, long before the 2014 Act. This has included tax treatment of VIP points - different for poker promotions (discount on fixed fee) to marketing expenses for other gambling like free bets (not tax deductible), geolocation, trivial things like top up and auto rebuy that were threatened in the UK, third party software, bots, player fund protection, self exclusion, including ability to exclude from everything but poker, pursuing colluders and botters as criminals under the 2005 UK Act that makes cheating a criminal offence, excessive licensing costs for poker sites, the confusion around B2B and B2C firms in poker networks.

There are others with skin in the game and years of work on this stuff. Hours spent reading tax docs or remote technical standards, hours more responding to consultations, meetings with regulators, nagging about things like site disclosure on player funds seized for cheating and compensation paid....the list is endless.

From my experience, you are barking up the wrong tree by seeking back taxes on a retrospective basis. The Aus/Uk legal structure will not allow this for what I think are fairly obvious good reasons. I'm sure you can work them out. Not least that there is no current mechanism in Aus for taxing offshore firms, unlike the UK Point of Consumption tax that came in post the 2014 Act.

The UK tax system means wherever you are based you pay 15% of revenue on UK business but you pay zero for everywhere else. This is a tax advantage compared to some (OK Gib is only 0.5% and capped at £500k so not much) but in theory, if you ignore corporate taxes (which are also fairly low in the UK) basing in the UK makes tax sense but if they don't the UK gov gets it's pound of flesh anyway.

This is the tax model your mainly Aus business should lobby for copying, not some punishment past tax regime based either on total profits or Aus business that was not taxable at the time. That's a dead end - no chance.

Having listened to the hearing and reread it now our side was a little too dismissive of problems like cheating, bots, software, a level playing field. Obviously this is the right position when the question is prohibition or regulation BUT once the gov chooses regulation then there is still a huge job to make that regulation (and tax) fair. The UK model is undoubtedly the best yet but it still needs improvement and Aus have not even started on the tricky questions - including cheats.

I guess my point is that WHEN you/we win the argument for regulation then the same enthusiasm and participation is needed to get the regulation right, and I hope that you Luke can help with that.

I mean...they both have a heading and a photo of an online poker table. In terms of informative content one is a blurb and the other is a ***** thesis. I mean no disrespect but saying these two petitions are "amazingly similar" is akin to me claiming i look "amazingly similar" to channing tatum.

Also saying "I do admit Joey has helped the cause" is a big understatement. I am positive there would be no cause that was actually acted upon to this extent without the man. There would be no second spin of the dice.

We don't know each other and whether you have a personal agenda as some have mentioned is irrelevant to me. I wish everyone the best. However, this post seems to be an attack, questioning the motives of the very person who has been key in giving online poker in Australia a second chance. I just don't get it man...

Hey guys sorry I haven't been really paying attention but does anyone know what the date is for when the significant decision to prevent Aussies playing online will be?

Re: Luke v Joey
Luke, seems like you were on the front foot in regards to the IGA ban a while ago and you gave an effective presentation to non gambling people about poker vs other gambling types (which was terrific).
As context, Joey:
- gave an effective presentation bringing all the facts together at the hearing.
- brought this issue to the forefront of the liberal party (where he is a branch leader) and debated at a key conference.
- flew to Canberra and met with all sides of politics and was able to convince Leyonhjelm to invest political capital which ultimately led to the government hearing in poker.
- gave a presentation at the yearly libertarian conference.
- was a focal point for the alliance which gave people confidence to donate money for advertising and gave the poker sites a reference point when communicating with Australians about the likely IGA changes.
- orchestrated a social media campaign.
Joey did all this even though poker is just a hobby.
We're all on the same side here.

Hey Luke, the clue's in our name: Online Poker Players Alliance

Perhaps you could start a campaign for the operators. You could call it Poker Online Operators Pressure-group (POOP).

A couple of observations. Remember we are fighting for the same (main) cause. Getting hung up on matters relating to your ego (really does it matter who posted what first?) isn't helping and certainly criticising Joey
who has done stella work for us all isn't going to support you building a loyal base of aussie players with any future poker endeavours. For the record, Joey's coordination has been first class whereas you present as self-serving and bitter about past personal commercial issues.

I don't think it got linked so here's the smh article. Nice pic Joey.

http://www.smh.com.au/business/onlin...mxyy.html?btis

Any time parliament sits, poker could get banned.
If this happens, PokerStars will leave Australia within a month.

Here are the 2017 sitting dates
http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Sitting_Calendar

Parliament is sitting every month from now until December for a week or two.
We are hopeful the government will wait until the recommendations to the poker hearing are delivered. This will happen by Mid September.

Thanks appreciate the response

Joey i appreciate everything you've done to try and save online poker in aust.

I am a casual online player and i must have been living under a rock for the past few months. been catching up on all the news this weekend. I missed the submission deadline, will late submissions be accepted?

Honestly, I would never play on PAP for the soul reason that the owner comes as across as a complete and utter ****. I'll take Amaya over this whiny prick any day.

Thanks for everything Joey. I'm sure I can speak for the player group when I say we are all behind you 100% and really appreciate the work you've put in.

To Luke, we are all fighting for the same thing dude, saving online poker. I personally hadn't heard of PAP before you posted here and I can see this is only your 4th or 5th post. As you haven't been vocal on this side of the community maybe your efforts have gone unnoticed by some because of that.

Everyone us thankful for any contribution people put in but now is the time to band together not fight each other.