Quebec Cites Problem Gambling For Eliminating Online Gambling Competition

The provincial government of Quebec is again in the online gambling news for the wrong reasons. It will persist with clamping down on offshore online casino sites, but using a different modus operandi. It seems to have given up the route of asking the ISPs to block “offending” sites because that could be successfully challenged in law. So, rather than take on Canada's federal communications laws, Quebec finance minister Carlos Leitao has chosen public health legislation as a more convenient option.

The original plan envisaged Loto-Quebec drawing up a list of "illegal" online gambling operators and the provincial government then enacting law requiring the ISPs to block them, thus creating a monopoly for Espacejeux. But the Canadian federal Telecommunications Act has provisions that do not permit the ISPs from interfering with "the content or influence the meaning or purpose of telecommunications carried by ISPs for the public." Leitao has been advised that the federal communications route may not work, so he is adopting the public health approach, over which the province has more control.

The bottom line as all can see is that offshore online casinos are competing with the province's Loto-Quebec run Espacejeux, which is suffering as a result. Loto-Quebec has quantified the monetary advantage it could gain by eliminating the online competition. It is an additional revenue of CAD13.5 million in 2016-2017 and an additional CAD27 million in subsequent years.

This intended act of the Quebec government, fraught with dubious motives and questionable legality, has been condemned by opposition politicians, consumer watchdogs, privacy action groups, law experts, freedom of speech advocates and internet neutrality proponents. These vociferous groups have pointed out that the Quebec proposal to shut out Internet casinos sets a dangerous precedent that may later extend to other ecommerce sectors. What is even more appalling is that the provincial government’s own Quebec Working Group on Online Gambling has not supported this stand. After thoroughly studied the pros and cons of the genre, the group has concluded that Quebec should regulate and licence online gambling within the province. Referring to the so-called health issue, the Working Group reported that only 0.04% of the population was at risk of problem gambling, and that Quebecers generally spend little money or time gambling.

But despite repeated warnings that its chosen path will result in further confrontations with action groups and the possibility of judicial opposition in terms of the interference with the Internet, the Quebec provincial government is in no mood to relent.

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