The Liberal Party is strongly committed to poker machine harm reduction, while also providing the opportunity for people to exercise their free choice.

Treasurer, Michael Ferguson, said a re-elected Rockliff Liberal Government will move immediately to take further action on reducing poker machine harm, committing $100,000 to promote awareness of the Gambling Exclusion Scheme which includes third party exclusion.

"This will involve paid digital and traditional media advertising, as well as in-venue," Mr Ferguson said.

"The Scheme is an important initiative which allows a person with a close personal interest in the welfare of another, to apply to the Commission for an order to prevent them from gambling for up to 3 years.

"Importantly, we also remain committed to harm minimisation and will implement a mandatory card-based gaming system for electronic gaming machines as soon as reasonably practicable.

"We acknowledge that implementing such a system is a complex task and as such, the development and full and efficient implementation may take more time than originally anticipated."

In response to this, we will also implement a number of new poker machine harm reduction initiatives, including:

• Examine the option of implementing Automatic Responsible Gambling Systems (ARGS). We will look at other jurisdictions where capability is built into EGM software for detecting potential problem gambling behaviour in real time, enabling more direct intervention;
• Engage with venues interested in implementing Facial Recognition Technology (FRT). The option of implementing an FRT system for identifying excluded individuals could be considered by venues on an individual basis;
• To maintain the responsible conduct of gambling competency, every relevant employee would be required to undertake a Responsible Conduct of Gambling course with a registered training organisation every two years, instead of the current requirement of every five years.

"The Government remains committed to reducing the impact of gambling harm associated with Electronic Gaming Machines while preserving the freedom of play," Mr Ferguson said.