CANADIAN PROVINCES SHOULD NOT BE INVOLVED IN LOTTERIES

30 March 2007

Canadian media reacts to scandals involving retail ticket sellers

Friday's news that the CEO of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation, Duncan Brown has resigned just days before the release of an official enquiry into allegations that ticket sellers in the province are winning a disproportionate number of prizes (see previous InfoPowa report) continued to attract media comment this week.

The OLG announced Brown's departure Friday, saying: "By mutual agreement, Duncan Brown and the Board of OLG have decided a change of leadership is appropriate. Brown has stepped down from his post as CEO."

The corporation has been under scrutiny in recent months over claims that ticket sellers win more prizes than they should.

Ontario ombudsman Andre Martin launched an investigation and is expected to report the results today (Monday).

Writing in the CFP, associate editor and columnist Arthur Weinreb gives some background to the issue.

"Lotteries throughout Canada are coming under fire," he opines. "It began in Ontario after the CBC’s The Fifth Estate reported that owners and employees of retail stores that sell tickets claimed about 200 times the number of wins that ordinary patrons did.

"Last week this scandal had spread to Atlantic Canada province. Retailers were found to have won 10 times the amount that statistics estimated that they should have won. A spokesman for the Monckton N.B. Atlantic Lottery Corp. said that 25 wins of $25 000 or more are now under investigation. Investigations are also underway in [the Canadian province of] British Columbia

"The president of the Consumer Association of Canada, Bruce Cran, is calling for the RCMP to probe the high amount of wins by lottery retailers. Cran said, “They [retailers ticket sellers] shouldn’t be allowed to buy tickets at all."

"Ontario’s government run lottery corporation, the OLG, has come under fire for reasons other than for improper and fraudulent payouts. Formerly known as OLGC, the government spent $6 million of taxpayers’ hard earned money to drop the dreaded “C” from the company’s moniker; for reasons none of us are really clear about. It’s a safe bet that no one other than a few government bureaucrats with way too much time on their hands really understands why OLGC just had to change its name to plain old OLG. This change was nothing less than a shameful gouging of Ontarians," Weinrib claims.

"Back in the olden days, when federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty not only held the same position with Ontario but was actually a conservative, he espoused the theory if something could be advertised in the Yellow Pages the government shouldn’t be doing it.

"[Now] there is no one around who will argue that Ontario should get out of the lottery business. Current Ontario PC leader John Tory’s solution to the problems of OLGC -C is to throw good money after bad and conduct a forensic audit. And then what? Well, the lottery will go back to business as usual.

"Moves are underway south of the border to privatize state run lotteries, albeit for different reasons. Illinois, Indiana and Texas are among the states that are thinking about selling their lotteries in order to bring money to their cash starved states. If a state sells or leases their lottery, they get a large infusion of cash upfront, together with yearly royalties. John Filan, the chief operating officer of Illinois said, “This is fundamentally a retail business and governments are not equipped to manage retail businesses. Gaming is getting so competitive around the world that we’re worried our revenues could go down unless there is retail expertise to run the lottery.”

"Problems such as store owners and employees cheating could happen in the private sector too. But governments have no power to remedy the situation in a timely fashion. There will be discussions, debates, likely an investigation by the RCMP who are still investigating the 1985 Air India crash but any meaningful change to the way lotteries are run will be years away. In the meantime, nothing will change.

"Governments should simply get out of the lottery business and allow it to be run by people who not only know what they are doing but don’t have the time to sit around debating whether or not a “C” should be dropped.

Online Casino News courtesy of InfoPowa

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