The Gambling Regulation Bill may well have been signed into law by the time you read this.
The legislation was being rushed through the Oireachtas in recent days, presumably to avoid being guillotined if a general election is called.
So what is the Act going to achieve?
Well, it establishes the Gambling Regulation Authority of Ireland, which is long overdue. Up to now, various Government departments handled different aspects of betting, so this brings the whole sector under one regulator, which will issue licenses and enforce standards.
The legislation pays a lot of attention to gambling advertising. Basically, it will be illegal for betting companies to advertise during daylight hours.
This is being done primarily to protect the vulnerable, especially young people. It’s easy to enforce on radio and television, but what about online advertising?
For the moment, everyone with a phone is potentially carrying a casino around in their pocket and it’s open all hours
My adult children (18 and 20) never listen to radio and rarely watch TV. Will they see fewer gambling ads on their phones?
The Bill appears to apply restrictions to social media platforms, but it’s hard to see that being effective, considering the ongoing failure of practically all social media sites to take down offensive or misleading content in a timely manner.
Is Instagram going to make sure that Paddy Power’s posts are invisible to Irish users between 5am and 9pm? Actually that should be easy to do, but let’s see if that happens.
For the moment, everyone with a phone is potentially carrying a casino around in their pocket and it’s open all hours.
Champion reflections
A few weeks ago, this column was giving out about Irish Champions Festival, the two-day flat racing meeting at Leopardstown and the Curragh.
The complaints were mainly frustration over the lack of engagement from the general public but the quality of the racing was never in question.
Just how blessed we are in terms of top flat horses was hammered home last weekend while watching the two-day Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe fixture in Paris – the French equivalent of our ‘Champions Festival’.
On Saturday at ParisLongchamp, Aidan O’Brien had four winners including both the Group 1 races on the card. Two of his winners were long odds-on. If a French trainer dominated one of our big meetings like that, we would be voting to leave the EU in the morning.
It didn’t get much better for the French on Sunday. A British horse ridden by an Irish jockey won the Arc. The Brits won two other Group 1 races and Aidan O’Brien took another.
Overall, the home team won just two of the eight Group 1s over the weekend, which is actually fairly typical for this weekend.
On top of that, the Arc meeting was run (once again) on bad ground. Irish Champions Festival, staged three weeks earlier, enjoyed much better conditions.
Chances are that the ground will also be heavy at Ascot for Britain’s Champions Day on 19 October, so really, our own little festival isn’t doing too badly. I just wish more people would support it.
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