For one: where was the regulator when some fairly outrageous behaviour was going on?

It’s easy to attribute blame in all this and the Office of Gaming and Liquor Regulation has a pretty full load of responsibilities, but the question hasn’t been asked and notably wasn’t part of the inquiry’s terms of reference.

The issue is, the public doesn’t know and is unlikely to ever know whether the OLGR dropped the ball or was deceived, or didn’t have the appropriate power – and that’s a fairly significant issue.

Secondly, the developers of the Queen’s Wharf project which will house Brisbane’s new casino, the Destination Brisbane Consortium, have had some serious questions raised in media reports recently about the alleged links to organised crime by joint venture partners, notably the Chinese Triads. For clarity, this does not refer to Star Entertainment.

Not a peep of that was raised in the Gotterson inquiry because, once again, it wasn’t part of the terms of reference.

The inquiry has done what it was supposed to, however, much of the evidence was already known or assumed. The China Union Pay credit card issue was the subject of hearings in Sydney. The years of gambling carried out by underworld figures on the Gold Coast was the subject of media reports , although a fair bit more colour was added to that issue.

Star’s fairly weak response to money laundering concerns were also raised in the Sydney inquiry.

So, we are left with an inquiry that has confirmed what was known and left serious questions unasked.

Star is likely to face some serious sanctions and so it should. At one point staff who perhaps should have known better, were alerted by media reports about underworld figures gambling on the Gold Coast and failed to look further because they didn’t have a subscription to the news organisation carrying the report.

Spelling errors in the name of one gambler who had been banned from casinos interstate, and had been the subject of media reports, meant Star didn’t twig it was the same person who was gambling on the Gold Coast.

Star says it is a much better organisation today than when these issues occurred, but we don’t know. We have to take their word for it.

There is another question: Is Star an organisation that should hold a casino licence?

Clearly, it wasn’t a few years ago when all this occurred but it has apparently cleaned up its act. As for the future of the casino in Brisbane and whether Destination Brisbane is a proper organisation: well, we just don’t know.