Online Gambling, Casinos, Poker and Sports Betting Magazine

Poland to Ban Online Gambling

Polish leaders have organised an anti-gambling campaign to ban online casinos. Prime Minister Donald Tusk is planning to make all gambling outside of casinos illegal and also raise taxes on the gambling industry.

However some critics are claiming the move is an attempt to take attention away from the government’s corruption and recent political scandals. Grzegorz Makowski from the Institute of Public Affairs has said, “He covered the problem of corruption with the problem of gambling” A study has also found that Poland is one of the worst Europeans countries for government transparency.

The decision comes after various scandals involving members of government and the gambling industry were bought to light. Four high officials were then forced to resign after accusations that they were letting the gambling industry sway their decisions.

The investigation known as ‘Operation Blackjack’ saw the Minister for Sport, Minister and Justice and the Deputy Prime Minister resigning from their positions after wire tapped conversations involving them were leaked.

Others have also hypothesized that the increase in tax shows that the country, which is set to co host the 2012 European Football Championships with Ukraine, are struggling to fund the event. However those against the ban are also proposing that the same amount of revenue could be gained by regulating online gambling rather than eliminating it altogether and putting an extra tax on land casinos.

However Polish online gamblers don’t seem too threatened by the proposal as various laws banning online gambling in their country have been and gone before.

Danielle Almond