EUROMAT News Bulletin 2 December 2011

EU AFFAIRS

01/12/11 – The Conference "Online gambling at a policy crossroads: Towards an EU regulatory approach or increased member States' cooperation?", organised by the Centre for Mediterranean Europe Foundations (MESEURO) in collaboration with Lottomatica Group and Sisal, took place in Brussels. In general, participants agreed on the need to first enhance cooperation between national regulators before considering whether there is an actual need for EU legislation. The representative from the European Commission explained that the Commission’s aim will be to deal with the cross-border aspect of online gambling and help Member States maintain their national systems.

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30/11/11 – The 2nd Annual International Gaming Law Summit 2011 took place in London. EUROMAT’s Secretary General, Lucy Cronin, who participated in the panel “The European Green Paper: A Glimmer of Hope for Harmonisation?”, stressed the need to ensure a level playing field across the entire gambling arena. Ms Cronin explained that, although harmonisation of gambling rules would not be the right approach, an EU framework Directive exclusively addressing the online sector, due to its cross-border nature, should be considered to achieve proper enforcement of rules and guarantee consumer protection.

29/11/11 – The Council of the EU adopted conclusions on combating match-fixing, which aim to foster close cooperation and information sharing between Member States, the European Commission, the sports world and gambling operators in order to tackle this problem. Furthermore, the Council called for the development of educational programmes and better monitoring systems and invited the Commission to analyse the current situation in order to present recommendations to address the problem of match-fixing. 

28/11/11 – The European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA) and the Remote Gambling Association (RGA) filed a complaint with the European Commission regarding the recently adopted Greek online gambling law. The complaint details a range of uncompetitive measures and non-EU compliant barriers to new market entrants, which place unnecessary and unjustified economic burdens on new operators.