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Alberta Studies Gov't Online Poker Site via Polls
Mon, Feb 12th, 2007 @ 12:00am
The Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission is reportedly considering creating websites for people to play poker, blackjack or to bet on sports online. The commission has ordered two polls to gauge how Albertans feel about the idea.
Marilyn Carlyle-Helms, spokeswoman for the commission, says they're in the early stages of player research. She says they're "moving slow and steady" on the idea.
She cautioned that the media has overplayed her comments by suggesting that Alberta is making a decision right now whether to get into the online gaming business. She says the gaming commission is simply doing telephone and online surveys with 800 Albertans to find out if they like gambling online and what games they play.
The poll is looking at poker, bingo and blackjack. It should wrap up mid-February, with results tabulated sometime in March.
Alberta is projected to take in CAD$1.4 billion (roughly USD$1.19 billion, or 0.61 GBPounds, or 0.92 billion Euros) this fiscal year from gaming revenues, mostly from video lottery terminals (VLTs), casinos and bingo.
Mo Elsalhy, Liberal gaming critic, said adding Internet gambling to the province's income is "a dangerous turn." He added, "We definitely have to talk about weaning government off its addiction to gambling revenues."
Another Liberal member of legislature, Laurie Blakeman, called the concept "one of the dumber ideas" conceived by the Conservative government.
Online gambling is an increasingly popular method for governments around the world to find additional revenues for their coffers. Unfortunately, rather then openly competing with other online sites, governments often pass protectionist policies to preserve their 'gold mines'.
France and Germany and a number of other EU countries have been admonished by the European Commission for their protectionist policies towards their state-owned online gambling sites.
The World Trade Organization (WTO) has repeatedly cited the United States for protectionist practices specifically for making online horse betting sites from other countries illegal while promoting their own sites, in a case brought against the US by Antigua and Barbuda beginning in 2003. The WTO final report on that case is due out this March.
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