Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Perhaps it was political folly, but I do not know that it is given the damage being done to families. Families are being destroyed. Let us consider what wives are told. The man who came to see me haunts me. I have thought of him going home to his wife and asking her to sit down because there is something he has to tell her. This haunts me because in 1983 when my business went bust, I had to walk out of the Bank of Ireland at 43 Eyre Square, go home to my wife and ask her to sit down because there was something I had to tell her. I had to tell her that I had lost not alone the business but our home and everything we owned as a result of a bad business venture. I had never backed anything much in my life, but I had backed a business that went wrong. I think of the pain and suffering that my wife went through at the time.

Now let us consider that in the context of the nonsense of gambling. Let us suppose I had taken the money and put it on a horse, a roulette wheel or whatever. I may have had to explain to my family that I had destroyed their lives, lost their home and all of their assets. The man in question told me about getting up in the middle of the night to get his smartphone for a couple of shots on the roulette wheel. I asked him whether it was the excitement of waiting for the win. He said that, in truth, the excitement passed the moment the bet was laid. He said he never cared whether he won or lost, it was a question of laying the bet. Waking up in the middle of the night to lay a bet is bad form. I call on the Minister of State to take on board Senator O'Brien's amendment and to amend the Bill. We need to do something urgently.