German Finance Minister pushing for online gambling legislation approval

Saxony-Anhalt Finance Minister, André Schröder, has warned that the online gambling legislation efforts of Germany might be failed if its 16 federal individual states do not implement the proposed “Interstate Treaty on Gambling” the sooner.

The Interstate Τreaty has been in place since 2012, but has not yet been implemented since the 16 states of the country do not agree with the legislators and because of the confrontation of the EU authorities. According to the Treaty, online sports betting operators will be able to apply for licence and operate.

Schröder reported on media: “The Prime Ministers of all the federal states have agreed on changes to the gaming contract, which was a month-long struggle and a process of weighing up the debts, mainly to address the problems of enforcement that we have with the current regulations – online casinos and sports betting – and to ensure consumer protection.”

“Saxony-Anhalt is in favour of this gaming agreement with its amendments. It is now important to ensure ratification.”

Schröder added: “If the ratification fails in individual countries, then these regulations cannot be applied nationwide as of January 1, 2018. This is unfortunate, because then the current regulations simply would continue.”

“Then the execution problems would continue. That is why we are very much campaigning for the counties to ratify. If this is not the case, we need to consider how we can deal with the continuity of current regulations and what we can do to protect consumers.”