Will online casinos soon be legal in all of Canada?
This is one of the questions that the Internet community in Canada often asks. I myself, could never understand why is gambling often put in the same line with drugs or other criminal activity. Actually, I do know why. It’s because it is not regulated by the government and is in the “gray zone”. That makes it perfect for the criminal establishment to use it for their own needs and make money out of it. Of course, since this is illegal, the government will not see a cent of this money.
Fortunately, Canadian government has a little more relaxed attitude towards online casinos than, say US government and doesn’t try to pursue players for visiting these web sites. In fact, I can think of only one case when that happened and that was in 2001. Still, you have to bear in mind the fact that according to Canadian law, it is illegal to gamble in places that are not regulated (read owned) by them.
Some Canadian provinces, like British Columbia and Quebec have opened up their own online casinos and they regulate their business quite nicely so far. But the problem is in the fact that they are restricted and only people who are located in that province can play. This means that they lose countless potential players, but on the other hand, they are able to better regulate the money flow. This way, the money stays in the province and the government of it will probably see it in some other way.
However, the Kahnawake Indian reserve was able to work around this law. As you well know, the Indian reserves in Canada have almost complete autonomy from the rest of the land and the natives are allowed to do whatever they want inside it. These freedoms are guaranteed by the Canadian constitution. This gave the idea to the natives in Kahnawake to make the Kahnawake Gambling Commission and regulate online casinos themselves. The online casino web site only needs to be located on their secure server.
The situation with Kahnawake Gambling Commission is still not quite over as the government of Canada still disputes their right to do this, but as this stand so far, we can soon expect the government of Canada to finally let go and allow the natives to regulate gambling games in their own reserve.
I am sure that soon Canadian government will see the benefit of legalizing online casinos and that they will do so in the near future. Otherwise, they will continue to spend countless dollars on futile law suits on particular online casinos, those that they can reach, that is. The current situation is not enough and will continue to cause problems until it is completely regulated.
The ones that can really benefit here are the players as they will know what to expect when they enter a legal casino, that is licensed and regulated by the commission that is backed by the government. They will know when to expect payments and know that their accounts will be safe.