Italy’s Ministry of the Economy and Finance is leading a reorganization plan for the country’s gaming sector.
Although there is consensus among multiple parties for reform, nothing was done in 2021. This year the demand rose for reforms on betting shops, gaming machines, online and brick and mortar casinos.
The ministry has released a preliminary draft whose stated goal is “minimizing problem gambling, terminating black market activities and optimizing tax incomes from licensed businesses.”
This includes a “territorial reorganization” of retail operators with the goal of reducing their numbers and concentrating them “in safe and controlled venues.”
The ministry also wants to require all operators to be part of a problem-gambling self-exclusion program. It also wants to be granted the powers to use federal police to investigate and enforce against unlicensed operators.
It also recommends that “gambling tax evasion to be treated as a high-level crime.”
