Tasmania became the first state in Australia to open a casino in 1973, and since then it has become a place where the gambling lobby’s influence on politics is most bald-faced. Now, a bill before Tasmania’s upper house has brought that influence into the open. Laura Murphy-Oates speaks to lower house independent Tasmanian MP Kristie Johnston and inequality reporter Stephanie Convery about the bill and how the pokies industry came to hold so much power in Tasmania