22/02/2010, Online casino

The new internal market commissioner Michel Barnier revealed his intention to develop a new strategy in order to clarify online gambling and to make things run smoothly.

Michel Barnier intends to unify and to adopt a clear position on the differences and disputes that various member nations have regarding online gambling.

Several member nations, including Germany, France, Greece, Portugal, refused to conform their laws to the EU standards, mainly because their online gambling laws give local operators or state owned monopolies, an advantage over private European providers of online gambling services. Some of them claim that they are restricting licensing foreign online casinos for protecting problem gambling victims and adolescents from unregulated gambling.

Michael Barnier wants to consult with EU member states, stakeholders and countries, such as Malta, whose economy is being based on the online gambling industry and which represents a major base for Internet gambling operators.

Malta believes national markets shouldn't be able to restrict other member states and it was a proponent of regulated and licensed online gambling operations.
Other countries tried to monopolize their gambling markets and they refused overseas operators access.

“We will be on the lookout as we think remote gaming should follow free movement. Malta is all for more clarification of the rules, but these should not be used to introduce restrictive practices," said a gambling expert from Malta.