ESSA wants the European Union to adopt comprehensive rules to help ensure sports integrity across Europe and prevent fixing contests.
ESSA Co-Chairman Mike O’Kane in mid October unveiled ESSA’s British Integrity Action Plan to reduce match-fixing to the European Parliament.
The plan calls for adopting several preventative measures, such as player education, high-level sports governance, risk management for regulated betting operations, and investigative and enforcement procedures via prosecution to root out fraud and criminal activity.
“What we have sought to achieve is a detailed strategic joint approach across all sectors to tackling match-fixing,” O’Kane said. “It is imperative that similar practices are adopted not just across the EU, but globally, if we are serious in our desire to drive out those criminal elements that are seeking to manipulate sport to defraud betting operators and consumers.”
He said it is important to adopting and promote standardized practices that prevent fixed events and ensure integrity among legal professional sports and better regulate sports betting operators.
“Where possible, common standards are beneficial and this action plan, developed in one of the foremost sporting and regulatory gambling jurisdictions in the world with a highly effective sports betting integrity model, provides the best potential basis for that,” O’Kane told EU lawmakers.
O’Kane was among several speakers invited to appear before the EU Parliament to address fixed sporting contests.
ESSA represents most of the world’s biggest regulated betting operations.
