by Renee Israel
The news that the UK government is set to make changes to its online gambling
laws once more has been met with mixed feelings across the board.
There were certain segments of the report issued by the Department for
Culture, Media and Sport, that could be seen as a good point for UK consumers
and the horse racing industry.
After all, the government stated that the new laws were proposed in order to
protect consumer and generate more income for the UK horse racing world.
Many in the business see it as only fair that offshore operators who
advertise in the UK market pay a fair tax for that right.
This also applies to horse racing levies that UK sports bettors are
subject to, and yet offshore groups are not.
While all this may be good in theory, and a fully licensed and regulated
market may be the answer to the healthy development of the UK gambling industry
in the long run, in practice things may be much harder to implement.
For one, the question remains how the government will actually go about
taxing offshore groups.
True, many of them are blatantly targeting UK players, but some are not.
Where would one draw the line? How would a future government judge which sites
get taxed and which don't?
A number of major countries in the world have tried - and certainly failed -
to control internet gambling through the blocking of IPs and so on.
The UK Gambling Act succeeded partly by introducing its White List, which
gave the green light to offshore countries in specific licensing jurisdictions
in the world to advertise in the UK.
Ironically, it is the government's own Act that opened up the door to foreign
companies to target UK consumers, and was the trigger for groups such as
Ladbrokes and William Hill to more their online operations offshore.
