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The 5th Annual International Conference & Forum on Gaming Industry & Public Welfare took place on the 22nd – 24th November 2008 at the prestigious Four Points Sheraton in Beijing, China. George Mangion, Senior Partner, PKF (Malta) Accountants & Business Advisors has been invited by the China Center for Lottery Studies, Peking University to present a comprehensive study on the “The road to a legalised global online gambling”.
Professor Yang He, Vice President of Peking University, addressed the opening of the conference. Other keynote speakers included Raymond Chan Executive Director of Macao SAR, Professor Jia Kang Director of Research Institute Ministry of Finance, China; Professor David Forrest, Centre for the Study of Gambling, University of Salford, UK, and Professor William R. Eadington, Director University of Nevada, Reno, USA. In all a total of 41 speakers addressed the three-day conference attended by over 300 delegates.
The subject of problem gambling, its prevention and early detection was also addressed by a number of counsellors, including policy formation regarding other areas of interest such as the planning of individualised therapy for people with gambling problems.
Mr Mangion presented a comprehensive study on various European jurisdictions, which have different laws that regulate on-line gaming. In Europe the laws vary from the strictly prohibitionist to the liberal. Recent European Court of Justice (ECJ) rulings are clearly signalling that outright prohibition is seen as a breach of the freedom of services within EU. Hopefully this trend will get stronger as the EU pushes more for liberalization and increased transparency in this still emerging market.
The situation is by far better than the last two years however there will still be one issue, which remains crucial, is that state monopolies are still trying to safeguard their existing restrictive legislation. Aiding liberalisation of the gaming and gambling legislation will not be an easy task, main crucial issue being tax. A harmonized tax regime is not something easy and surely cannot be and will not be decided overnight. The European Commission headed by Mr Charlie McCreevy are doing their utmost to overcome such problems and find a common solution that will be accepted by the majority of the member states.
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