Senate blocks level playing field in sports-betting bonanza
The teams are set — let the pregame banter begin! It’s Super Bowl time again, and fundamental to all the analysis and coverage will be the betting line, the prop bets, and the over-under.
Yes — the wagering, which will be significant.
As bettors flock there to place their bets, Las Vegas is gearing up for one of its biggest weekends of the year.
Nevada, the only legal sports wagering jurisdiction in North America, is expecting more than 200,000 extra visitors for Super Bowl weekend.
They will be wagering about $90 million on the game and spending another $150 million — not bad for a weekend in February.
What’s preventing something similar in Canada?
The simple answer: a handful of unelected senators in Ottawa.
While sports wagering has been legal in Canada for decades, we are unable to bet on the outcome of a single event.
If you want to bet on the Super Bowl, you must “parlay” your bet with two other events — say an NHL hockey game and a Premier League Football match. Under this scenario, more often than not your bet will be a loser before the pre-game starts.
To correct this, almost two years ago the House of Commons with all-party support passed Bill C290, an act to amend the Criminal Code removing the prohibition against single event wagering, in March 2012.
Since then it has been stalled in the Senate despite testimony at hearings from law enforcement, provincial gaming operators, gaming regulators, international sports organizations and legal experts in support of the change, as well as problemgambling experts who support passing the bill as being better than the status quo. What is the status quo? It is reliably estimated that Canadians are spending more than $4billion annually through illegal offshore online sports books that are easily available to anyone with Internet access. But it doesn’t stop there.
Canadians are betting up to a further $10 billion through illegal bookmaking operated by organized crime, such as the Hells Angels.
(Senators) are ceding the billions of dollars Canadians are wagering on sports to the hands of illegal offshore operators and organized crime.
By way of comparison, “parlay” bets, the legal sports wagering offered through provincial lottery corporations, capture about $500 million annually — a pittance next to the $14 billion otherwise bet.
We all remember the Hells Angels Super Bowl party just north of Toronto last year, thrown for their 1,000 best customers, that was raided by the RCMP. We also all remember that those customers were just ordinary people, like our friends and neighbours, who like to bet on sports and have no legal alternative.
There is broad support for change.
Nine provincial governments have requested Bill C290 be passed, and consumers have voted with their wallets. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian Labour Congress and cities such as Niagara Falls and Windsor, which would love to welcome tourists the first weekend in February, have all passed resolutions in support of Bill C290.
In the Senate, senators such as Terry Mercer of Nova Scotia, Bob Runciman of Ontario and the late Doug Finlay have all supported the bill and kept it moving.
What has stymied the will of Parliament are a minority of senators who want to step back in time and once again debate the “morality” of gaming, or who think that prohibition is somehow better than giving Canadians a legal, regulated environment with strong consumer protection.
By delaying the bill they are ceding the billions of dollars Canadians are wagering on sports to the hands of illegal offshore operators and organized crime — more than $26 billion since the bill entered the Senate almost two years ago.
This leaves communities like Windsor and Niagara Falls, Ont., unable to capitalize on a great tourism opportunity and denies Canadians a legal, regulated opportunity to bet on the Super Bowl.
Isn’t it time for all this to change?