Brussels, 14/01/2011 (Agence Europe) - While the European Commission is preparing for the publication of a Green Paper on internet gambling, due in March, the president of the new French authority for regulating online gaming (ARJEL), Jean-François Vilotte, set out his recommendations on the subject on Thursday 13 January for the internal market and youth and sport commissioners, Michel Barnier and Androulla Vassiliou.
Last June, at the behest of the European Commission, France had liberalised this economic sector and created the ARJEL authority which, among other things, aims to combat fraud in online betting, to counter addiction and protect minors. It is also responsible for giving its consent to foreign operators that may now, without being established on French territory, propose their games to French internet browsers.
This law, however, has not settled everything, as the French regulator explained to the Commission. The latter plans to reflect on minimum harmonisation of the European online gaming sector, as there is currently different legislation in the 27 member states, by identifying the scope it may grant to member states. The EU Court of Justice has regularly pointed out that primary competence falls on member states when it comes to online gambling.
ARJEL believes, nonetheless, that the EU has a real card to play in fighting fraud and corruption, and in the recognition of bans on unlawful sites set up, for example, in one member state albeit registered in another. ARJEL hopes for true cooperation between member states and effective information- and means-sharing on this subject, so that measures for banning gaming pronounced at national level will not lose their effectiveness, explains Jean-François Vilotte. Ninety percent of formal notices to sites from ARJEL since June 2010 concern operators based in the EU. For corruption, it would perhaps also be appropriate, Vilotte says, to create a European early warning system that would take effect as soon as the “principle of sincerity of sports competitions” is tainted by suspicion.
This is a matter that causes increasing concern for the International Olympic Committee (IOC), explains Jean-François Vilotte, as well as the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, which is preparing a recommendation to its member states for 2011 on fighting fraud and corruption in the sporting field. The text would in particular work on a more or less common definition of “crimes of sporting fraud”. A draft relating to crimes of sporting fraud is precisely one of the proposals that ARJEL plans to submit to the European Commission. (S.P./transl.jl)