Average Lotto punt matches price of a family dinner

Lotto customers are spending an average of $14 on each purchase, the Lotteries Commission has revealed.

The sum is just $1 less than the budget set by supermarket chain Countdown for menu suggestions for a family dinner for four.

Giving evidence to Parliament’s social services select committee, Lotteries Commission chief executive Chris Lyman said its model was based on ‘‘a large number of people spending a small amount of money with a small chance to win big’’.

But he acknowledged its average expenditure per transaction had been gradually tracking up.

Suggested prices for popular ‘‘triple dip’’ Powerball options on MyLotto range from $16 to $28.

Total Lotto sales – across all its games – jumped 28 per cent over two years, to total almost $1.25 billion in the year to June 2018.

Problem Gambling Foundation marketing director Andree Froude said $14 would be a significant portion of some people’s weekly budget.

Lotto’s maximum allowed spending limit of $150 a week, including $50 on instant games, was ‘‘quite high’’, she said.

Lyman said the Government had let the commission retain $8 million from its revenues for an overhaul of its core gaming system and its ‘‘aging’’ internet gaming platform.

Lyman and commission chairman Matthew Boyd stated in the commission’s annual report that they wanted to make buying Lotto products ‘‘easier and more convenient’’, and to reduce the commission’s dependency on ‘‘jackpot-fuelled growth’’.

But addressing MPs, Lyman emphasised the tools that its new technology platform would offer to combat problem gambling.

The new platform, which should be completed by May next year, would use data and artificial intelligence to allow players to be ‘‘better informed’’, he said.

Lyman said online sales now accounted for 20 per cent of the commission’s overall revenues.