1. Hon. Speaker, the amendments to the National Gambling Bill are progressive in nature, with emphasis of Board to Regulator.
2. The MF has serious concerns regarding the time it would take to complete this transition and the costs on implementation.
3. Furthermore, the period of 5 years to remove illegal operators from activity is too harsh and the MF believes the intention is to regulate gambling activities then this period should be reduced to 24 months.
4. Current economic markets are failing, Hon.members, so these regulatory efforts need to correct market failures, especially the negative impact of illegal on licensed operators, hence a balancing act is required.
5. Overall, this National Gambling Amendment Bill has reached as far as disallowing bad practices to persist but more work has to be done in terms of social responsibility and the MF would like to see more amendments to maximise social welfare and minimise social costs if it has to embark on its work of real regulation, hence the MF supports the abstention, as per the portfolio committee.
6. Thank you.

Hon. S. Thakur- Rajbansi

Debated Virtually