And you can bet your bottom dollar the money is being lost by some of the most vulnerable people in the community, the ones who need it most.

It is cash that could and should be spent on other things, clothes or food for example. Instead it is mindlessly punted into one of the most insidious forms of gambling there is, the pokie machine.

Thirty-three million dollars is a massive amount of money out of our community, but it is a tiny slice of the $2.5 billion sucked out of Victoria as a whole by pokie machines alone. The state’s total spend on all forms of gambling would be much greater still.

In Victoria, pokies are operated by Crown Casino, Tatts Group and TABCORP and they control 27,500 pokies in clubs and hotels.

While these venues host the desperate day after day, it is the online gambling space that is grooming a new generation of losers.

Smartphones, tablets and laptops are the latest tools for gamblers and they are of particular interest to the gaming giants because they are the playthings of the young.

It has never been easier to throw away a hard-earned dollar. You literally lose with the tap of a screen or keyboard.

Gambling is a goldmine for operators and government making reform unlikely.

But for those at the bottom of the ladder — the mug punters — gambling addiction is a serious illness.

Addicts who don’t seek help spiral downwards into the same kind of darkness that haunts drug users — a horrible cycle of poverty, hopelessness and crime.

The Victorian government puts gambling revenue back into the community through rehab programs, education, counselling and other initiatives aimed at limiting the damage caused by problem gambling.  

It knows that this is the least it can do, because for every gambler that does it for fun and has it under control there is another for whom it has become a life-destroying curse.