Online Casinos to be Taxed in Ireland

Irish Taoiseach Brian Cowen announced last week that he planned on taxing online gambling firms and telephone betting companies that accessed the Irish market. Offshore internet companies will be required to obtain licensing to provide online gambling services to the citizens of Ireland, if the bill should go through. Foreign operators are not required to pay any monies to the Irish government at the present time.

“This will have the more benefit of facilitating the extension of the tax regime for the betting industry to all those providing online and telephone betting and support funding for the race industry.” Mr. Cowen replied.

“Such betting must be brought within the tax net it will mean that those currently not contributing to secure the future of important indigenous industries will now make that contribution , and it will increase revenue.”

If foreign operators want to advertise to players within Ireland, they will have to pay tax to promote their services. While it may seem like a good idea for the well being of the economy, there are several issues that need to be taken into consideration. One issue is, there is no law that prevents Irish citizen from playing at gambling sites that have not acquired the requisite license. Also, there isn’t any way for the government to stop offshore gaming companies from accepting Irish players that have found the site over the internet and decided to make a deposit.

Companies like Paddy Power who own Paddy Power Casino and Ladbrokes who operate the successful online casino, Ladbrokes Casino, have criticised the proposal. The plan has not been received well with gaming companies currently operating in the country. Paddy Power has stated that taxing operators will not succeed as there is no way to prevent Irish gamers from playing at online casinos that have not acquired a gaming license.

Joe Lewins, MD of Ladbrokes Ireland has said that no amount of deterrents to stop companies offering online gaming, such as blocking IP addresses have worked in the past in other countries.