The Tradies Club has secured 73 poker machine authorisations from its old Woden club, ahead of a report that will help determine the future of the ACT's pokies trading scheme.
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The club also sold 17 authorisations to the Canberra Highland Society Burns Club for an undisclosed sum, ahead of the expected August release of Neville Stevens' review of the territory's poker machine system and diversification.
Canberra clubs are bracing for the report that will recommend how many machines they will have to surrender to the government by April next year, to meet the government's planned reduction to 4000 machines by 2020.
The Stevens report will form the basis of the government's plans to reach the reduction, as well as options for new incentives to help clubs diversify their income away from gambling machine revenue.
The new options to diversify clubs' income follow years of efforts to do so, including allowing clubs to deconcessionalise their land to use it commercially, the small clubs assistance scheme, and, since the 2016 election, handing out $10,000 grants to some clubs and a 50 per cent tax cut to clubs with revenue less than $4 million.
It comes as the territory government faces broader pressure to both reduce the number of machines on gaming floors in Canberra, and increase harm minimisation measures, in the wake of the Laurie Brown case, and calls to reform the club community contribution scheme.
Gaming Minister Gordon Ramsay has previously suggested the government's response to the Stevens' report would not involve any financial compensation for clubs losing machines.
While all clubs are meant to forfeit, trade or sell any licences from a club three months after it shuts down, the territory government allowed the Woden club, which closed in January this year, until June to trade its authorisations.
The ACT's Gaming and Racing Commission has confirmed that on June 20 this year, the Woden club transferred 97 of its 120 machine authorisations to the Dickson Club, forfeiting 24 authorisations, and sold 17 to the Burns Club, forfeiting four authorisations, with the remaining six authorisations also forfeited, a total of 34 forfeitures.
While ACT Greens leader Shane Rattenbury has recently admitted the trading scheme had not worked "as intended", the deal marks the biggest single forfeiture of machine authorisations since the scheme began in 2015.
Before the deal was reached over the Woden club's authorisations last month, only 41 authorisations had been forfeited by clubs since the trading scheme began, with 4457 machines still in operation at the end of May this year.
The CFMEU-linked Tradies Club has not returned calls about its specific plans, but Burns Club president Athol Chalmers said his club did not plan to use them to put any more machines on the floor.
The two clubs form part of the Canberra Community Club group that was formed in the wake of souring relationships between the government and Clubs ACT after the main clubs group campaigned against the government in the 2016 election.
Mr Chalmers said the Burns Club, along with the rest of the industry, was waiting on the Stevens report, and might use the extra authorisations to bolster its overall numbers, ahead of the planned surrender.
He also said he could not say what the club paid for the licences it bought, as it was a commercial matter.
It is unclear how many authorisations clubs will need to surrender as part of the government's reduction, though a discussion paper on the issue last year suggested most clubs would lose about 20 per cent.
On that estimate, the Tradies Club in Dickson would not have to actually remove any machines on the gaming floor, if it surrenders all the extra authorisations it secured from the Woden club.
Similarly, the Burns Club may have to surrender several machines, under that scenario, though the extra 13 authorisations from Woden would soften the blow for the club.
