Canadian government backs betting bill giving provinces power to regulate
Single-event betting bill to be debated in House of Commons as all three parties support the motion
The Canadian government has introduced a bill to decriminalize single event sports betting (SEB), potentially giving provincial governments the power to legislate full-blown wagering in their jurisdictions.
Pari-mutuel horseracing betting, which is already legal in Canada, has been left out of the bill and will continue to be regulated by the Canadian Pari-Mutuel Agency (CPMA).
Speaking during a press conference this morning, Minister for Justice David Lametti said he didn’t have a specific timeframe for legislation to be passed in the House of Commons as Canadian online gambling could soon be set to move in line with the US.
“I don’t know if we’ll get debate time immediately. Hopefully we’ll get some soon, but I really don’t want to speculate,” Lametti said, adding the bill had received support across all three political parties.
Supporting problem gamblers was a key reason for the government wanting to enact the legislation, according to Lametti.
“We will work with the provinces in terms of programming and identifying people that need assistance [and] it will be easier now to identify those that need help,” he said.
The Canadian government will also seek to open discussions with tribal gaming communities in the country to determine how they will fit into the legislation.
Lametti said Canada was losing approximately $7.8bn in single event wagers to offshore operators each year.
Toronto-based betting operator theScore is hugely excited to offer its betting app on home turf and expects many of the big US operators to express an interest in entering the Canadian market.
TheScore CEO John Levy told EGR North America: “We expect that a lot of the legitimate guys that we’re competing with in the states will probably want to come up here and compete as well and we’re starting to hear noise from some of the legacy traditional broadcasters all trying to figure out their positioning in the same way the big broadcasters in the states are trying to.”
TheScore, alongside a number of professional sports leagues in the summer, expressed support for legalizing single-event betting.
The operator estimates the legal SEB market could generate between $3.8 billion and $5.4 billion in annual gross gaming revenue