Bloggers / Matthew Pitt / 13 January 2010 /

A number of countries in the European Union have recently updated, or are in the process of updating, their online gambling laws and it now appears the the British Government is planning on following suit.

Italy introduced gambling licences for all online poker operators last year, charging each of them between 2% and 5% business tax and as a result have seen tax revenues soar. More recently the French government are busy changing the law so only operators based inside France can offer services to French customers.

Online gaming operators such as Betfair, Ladbrokes and William Hill are currently allowed to advertise within the UK without attracting levies, in fact Ladbrokes and William Hill both moved operation to Gibraltar last year to avoid such financial penalties and allow themselves to be more competitive with other offshore companies.

All this looks set to change in the near future as the Department of Culture, Media and Sport are proposing changes to the regulatory gambling structure which will almost certainly force offshore companies, who are currently licensed outside of the UK, to apply for a licence from the UK Gambling Commission. How this will affect online poker in the UK is yet to be seen.

Maybe it is because of the difficult financial times we are all facing that the government is planning these changes to make up for other shortfalls in revenue but in my opinion they have not really thought things through properly. It is less than 12 months ago that the government wanted to build a number of super-casinos and allow each of them to have slot machines with unlimited jackpots yet they want to put the squeeze on games that actually need skill to succeed? What happens next, only time will tell.

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