“The Star treated the [NSW Independent Liquor and Gaming] Authority with disdain, as an impediment to be worked around.”

Bell found the culture at Star was driven by profit, leading to practices that exposed it to significant risks including money laundering, criminals gambling and infiltration by organised crime.

Bell did not make any recommendations regarding which changes the Star need to be made to hold a casino licence, as it was not in the terms of reference. The NSW Independent Casino Commission will wait until after receiving Star’s show cause submission before deciding which action to take.

NSW Hospitality and Racing Minister Kevin Anderson described the casino’s operations as “disgraceful”.

“We are outraged as to the operations of this particular company. The flagrant disregard for the rules and regulations that they should be operating under is breathtaking,” he said.

However, he refused to be drawn on whether a failure of government regulation had enabled misconduct in the first place. “The commission will now receive the reports from Star over the next two weeks for procedural fairness, and the commission will have the power, the teeth and the ability to be able to impose whatever it requires to bring Star back into line.”

‘There’s a real reluctance to become as transparent as they need to be if they want to hold a casino licence.’

Phillip Crawford, NSW Independent Casino Commission head

The government’s gambling reforms give the commission power to strip Star of its licence, suspend it, impose monetary penalties and appoint a manager.

Crawford also queried why corporate regulator the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) had failed to take action against the former directors of Crown Resorts over its failings, and revealed he was “surprised” the Queensland government’s casino inquiry was so limited.

He said the introduction of cashless gaming cards to combat money laundering and organised crime across all Australian gaming outlets was “inevitable” and should be implemented over the next two years.

“I think the technology is not there yet, but once it picks up … I think that’ll permeate the whole industry in due course,” he said.

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Crawford’s comments suggest he believes Star must remove Hogg, who has been with the company for several years but only took over the CEO role recently, along with a host of other key middle and senior managers and multiple board members. He suggested Star appeared unwilling to reform under its current management and board.

“There’s a real reluctance to become as transparent as they need to be if they want to hold a casino licence.

“Nobody has sat down at this company and said, ‘Should we be doing this?’ Their attitude’s always been, let’s find a way to do this.”

He said there was “still quite a number of people there who are implicated in the bad conduct. Now, our disappointment is at the moment the company itself hasn’t dealt with that – but we will.

“At the moment, there’s a lot of people still there [at Star] that have been promoted within the system. They’ve been promoted by the people who have now gone and it’s all very unhealthy ... They [Star] have got to find a way, if they can, and I’m not sure they can, but trying to find their way back to satisfy the public that it is worthwhile putting some integrity and trust back into their business.”

Separately, Crawford criticised Hogg over his comments at the Gotterson casino inquiry in Queensland about allowing a person linked to organised crime to frequent its Gold Coast casino.

“When he was questioned about that, he [Hogg] virtually said, “Well, unless there’s evidence beyond reasonable doubt to the criminal standard that will stop him from gambling in Queensland, we thought it was OK.” And that person [Hogg] with that attitude is the acting CEO of the group.

“They thought it was fine for him to keep gambling up in Queensland for another 15 years, and it’s just ridiculous.”

In an apparent acknowledgement Star may have got off lightly in Queensland, Crawford said he was surprised the Gotterson inquiry had such a limited terms of reference.

“I was disappointed, but I think their regulator’s in a position where it can commence its own suitability analysis,” into Star, he said.

Hogg was in charge of Star’s Queensland operations before replacing CEO Matt Bekkier, who along with chairman John O’Neill was forced out of the company after the Bell Inquiry began verifying the revelations first uncovered by this masthead and 60 Minutes.

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