The Tribune

Dear Sir,

With a Gaming Board of four private individuals, and six Government civil servants, as published on July 26, 2017, on Page 8 of your newspaper, it seems that the Board as well as the Minister need educating on the effects of the gambling laws in this country.

The Minister, whose portfolio includes gaming, is concerned, quite rightly, with the effects an addiction to gambling is having in this country, as mentioned in the newspaper headlines. A limit should be placed on all customers, and if the KYC and regulators can't deal with this, then they must be made to apply such limits. Each account can be given a monthly limit depending on the person's income.

For many years, Bahamians were prevented from gambling in the casinos. Now, Internet gambling has swept the world.

A National Lottery and a new Gaming Act came into existence in Great Britain, which restrict participants to UK residents, who must also be citizens. Therefore, this money stays in the country, whether as government taxes, service fees to the operators of the lottery, or to prize winners.

I understand that legislation should include a provision that at least a minimum of 'x' per cent is set aside for prizes, and must be paid out to winners within 12 months of the lottery's monthly draw.

The economic benefits to the Government can be seen on the excellent Lottery web page, which you can 'google' at UK National Lottery. As much as £160 million seems to be collected every draw.

As the original vote in our Parliament made allowances for a National Lottery, surely the benefits of competition and transparency, and a professional private sector manager, would help address the concern that we now have a 'cartel' and a monopoly.

At least the Government would spend money collected in the interests of all Bahamians.

CONCERNED

TAXPAYER

October 9, 2017