Why is two-up illegal most of the year, and legal on Anzac Day?

Why two-up is illegal: gambling law catches it

Australia has no single two-up ban. Each state and territory has a gambling Act that lists unlawful games or bans unauthorised gambling, and two-up falls inside it. In New South Wales, s 5(1)(a) of the Unlawful Gambling Act 1998 names “fan-tan, pak-a-pu, two-up, hazard, baccarat, faro or roulette, or any similar game of chance”.

Section 14 of the same Act says “a person must not participate in, or bet on, an unlawful game”. South Australia’s Gaming Offences Act 1936 declares “two up” and “pitch-and-toss” unlawful games in s 59. Western Australia bans “two-up, other than permitted two-up” in s 42(1)(b) of the Gaming and Wagering Commission Act 1987.

Victoria takes a broader route. Section 2.2.1 of the Gambling Regulation Act 2003 says a person must not conduct unauthorised gambling, and s 1.3AA(3)(a)(ix) counts two-up as gambling. In the ACT and the Northern Territory, any gambling game run without authorisation is unlawful, so two-up needs an exemption like any other game.

Liquor & Gaming NSW sums it up in one line. Two-up, it says, “while illegal as an unregulated form of gambling most of the year, is legally played every Anzac Day, Remembrance Day and Victory in the Pacific Day”. The word that matters is unregulated. An exemption in the Act is what turns an unlawful game into a lawful one, for a day or for a place.

Where two-up is legal: all eight states and territories

Every jurisdiction exempts Anzac Day, but the conditions differ. Only New South Wales and the ACT let almost any venue run a game; elsewhere it’s RSL premises, ex-service clubs or permit holders. In NSW, South Australia, the ACT and Queensland, the exemption also requires that nobody takes a cut of the bets (ss 7, 19(2), 21 and 179).

Two common summaries only half fit this table. “Legal only in RSL clubs” comes close in some states but is wrong in NSW and the ACT, and “legal anywhere on Anzac Day” holds only in those two. Hours are written into the rules only in Tasmania, and in WA they go into each permit. For the day itself, see our guide to two-up on Anzac Day.

Why Anzac Day is the exception

The exception follows the diggers. An Australian War Memorial glossary of soldiers’ words compiled in 1921–24 calls two-up “the most popular game in the A.I.F.”. The Memorial also writes that “by the mid-1930s all the rituals we now associate with the day – dawn vigils, marches, memorial services, reunions, two-up games – were firmly established”.

The law caught up much later. When Queensland amended its Act in 2012, the minister’s statement said Anzac Day games had been “technically illegal” and that “police have traditionally turned a blind eye”. Bruce Moore of the ANU wrote in 2022 that two-up became legal on Anzac Day in most states “from the 1980s”.

The exemptions we could date from the Acts themselves are listed below. For WA, the NT and Victoria before 2014, we haven’t yet confirmed when the first exemption was made.

• 1995, South Australia: the Lottery and Gaming (Two up on Anzac Day) Amendment Act 1995; since 15 March 2007 the rule has sat in s 19 of the ANZAC Day Commemoration Act 2005.
• 1998, New South Wales: the Gambling (Two-up) Act 1998, with Victory in the Pacific Day and Remembrance Day added in 2005 (s 4A).
• 2009, ACT: Part 4 of the Unlawful Gambling Act 2009.
• 2012, Queensland: the Two-up Amendment Act 2012, assented to on 17 February 2012.
• 2014, Victoria: the current wording of s 2.2.4 of the Gambling Regulation Act 2003.
• 2024, Tasmania: the Liquor and Gaming Commission’s declaration of 4 September 2024.

When did two-up become illegal?

There’s no single date. We haven’t found one Act that first outlawed two-up, and Bruce Moore’s view is that “two-up was always illegal, because the game is an unregulated form of gambling”. Police raids are part of the record: Trove indexes a headline in The Argus of 3 November 1910, “TWO-UP SCHOOL TRAPPED. Police hide in timber-yard”.

In NSW the older rules sat in the Gaming and Betting Act 1912, which also held the Broken Hill authorisation. The Unlawful Gambling Act 1998 repealed it (s 60), leaving two Acts side by side: one listing unlawful games and one setting out the two-up exceptions. The name “two up” itself is first recorded in 1884; our page on two-up history and its words follows it from there.

Where two-up is legal on other days

Broken Hill is the NSW exception. Under ss 9–11 of the Gambling (Two-up) Act 1998, the Minister can authorise Broken Hill City Council to run games at an approved location. The authorisation sets the days, and the council may take a commission. The law and the Palace Hotel game are on our Broken Hill two-up page.

Western Australia goes further. A Ministerial permit can allow two-up at approved premises more than 100 km from Crown Perth, on any day except Christmas Day and Good Friday (ss 46(4), 81). Country race clubs beyond that radius can also run it after racing (s 80). That’s the likely footing for the Kalgoorlie two-up shed, though we haven’t seen its permit.

The Northern Territory has a race-day rule of its own. Under s 54(4)(a) of the Gaming Control Act 1993, a club can run two-up at a racing venue more than 80 km from the Darwin and Alice Springs casinos. The game must be held on a race day, for no more than four hours, starting after the last race.

Casinos

Casinos are the other lawful home. Two-up is an “Authorised Game” in cl 22(1) of the agreement in the Casino (Burswood Island) Agreement Act 1985, the deal behind Crown Perth, formerly Burswood Casino. The Victorian regulator lists two-up among approved Melbourne Casino games, and Queensland’s s 181 notes that the Casino Acts “grant casinos the exclusive right to conduct or play two-up”.

Authorised isn’t the same as open. On 27 September 2026 we found no two-up table or rules on Crown Perth’s website and couldn’t confirm a table at Crown Melbourne. Casino Canberra ran a one-day game on 25 April 2024, from 3 pm to 9 pm, as an “exempt two-up game” under ACT law. Casino rules also change the maths, as our page on two-up odds and the house edge shows.

Penalties for playing an unlawful game

Fines depend on the state and on your role at the game, and each Act’s penalty sections are named in the sources below. We convert penalty units to dollars only for NSW, where one unit is $110; we haven’t checked current unit values elsewhere, so the table gives units as each Act states them.

NSW adds two details. Under s 25 of the Two-up Act, a participant isn’t guilty if they didn’t know, and had no reason to know, that the game was unlawful. Betting with a minor carries 50 penalty units or 12 months (s 24).

Online two-up and the Interactive Gambling Act

Online versions fall under federal law. The Interactive Gambling Act 2001 (Cth) prohibits providing online casino games to people in Australia (s 15(2A)). Online two-up is a game of chance played for money, so it sits in that group. The penalties fall on the provider and advertiser, not the player.

Online two-up is only offered by offshore casinos, and no online casino can hold a licence in Australia. Our page on two-up online covers what people actually find when they search for it, including a free practice toss with no money involved.