Dutch government sets January date for egaming talks
Secretary of State addresses lotteries' fears over cannibalisation and reveals the country's new gaming law will be discussed by ministers at the end of January
The Dutch Secretary of State has revealed the country’s egaming bill will be discussed in parliament in January as he moved to allay lottery operators’ fear that a regulated online gaming industry would have a negative impact on their revenues and subsequently charitable contributions.
The lottery industry’s vociferous opposition to plans to introduce a licensing framework for domestic and foreign egaming operators has been one of the major sticking points in the political process since a draft bill was published earlier this year.
It claims regulating egaming would significantly cannibalise lottery sales and therefore payments to good causes, which include charities and sports clubs, would be reduced.
However Fred Teeven told the House of Representatives on Friday that legal online gambling, to be discussed within the council of Ministers in January, would in fact see sales of existing lotteries continue to grow thanks to the new opportunities online would bring.
He said that there was already a large market for online gambling in the Netherlands, and that “hundreds of thousands” of Dutch citizens are currently participating in the unregulated market.
“There is no reason to expect that contributions to charities and sports will be substantially reduced by regulating online gambling,” said Teeven. “Several studies show that substitution between online gambling and lotteries cannot be demonstrated.”
The final details of the country’s online gambling laws are still under discussion, however politicians have claimed the Netherlands remains on track for a 1 January 2015 launch.
Asked how the government can ensure charities would benefit from the regulation of online gambling, Teeven responded by claiming this would be a “beneficial side effect” but was not the primary goal.
“Licensed lotteries will also be given the opportunity to apply for a licence for online gambling, and to develop their own range of offerings to complement their current ones,” he said.
“This will allow players through their manner of playing, to also be guided to contribute to charity or sport with online service providers who do not have a commercial objective, but allow the proceeds to accrue to the benefit charities and sport instead of the shareholder.”
The European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA) said it shares Teeven’s view that contributions from gambling to charity and sports are important to society, adding that the regulation of online gambling will be a “major contribution to this”.
“Both recreational sports and charities will benefit from additional income and the opportunities generated by modernisation,” EGBA said in a statement.
EGBA secretary general Maarten Haijer added: “In Denmark, the ‘old’ state lottery, after modernisation of the policy even grew to a share of 62% of the online market. In Belgium, the National Lottery also strengthened to achieve its biggest ever sales (up 5%) in 2012.
“Both countries show that a viable gaming policy is the best guarantee for structural contributions.”
An English translation of Teeven’s responses can be found here.