News

Tuesday, 06 April 2010 07:25

A Liberal government that once vehemently opposed gambling expansion in Canada's British Columbia province have a sudden change of heart as dollar signs light up their eyes.

Gambling expansion and its perceived affect on communities was once the sworn enemy of podium thumping opposition politicians who vowed never to allow it to happen if they were voted into power. Well, they got their wish and in a few short years, that sacred vow crumbled to dust as a growing financial deficit had to be turned around. Well guess what the solution that sprang into the minds of those hard nosed defenders of public morality just happened to be?

What followed was the announcement that the proposed BC Palace Casino would be sited in Vancouver and you could almost hear the scurrying around as politicians and civil servants began falling over themselves to set the plan into action. It seems that the zoning process in Vancouver will not stand in its way, meaning a rapid implementation of the project and a major winning bet for the backers from Las Vegas.

It will become a veritable cash cow for the ruling Liberal government that they will be able to milk day in and day out taking a percentage of every gambling dollar from every customer's wallet. How did this incredible about-turn come about from a once such staunch opposition to gambling?

The original stance was a clear position on anti-gambling by British Columbian Liberal politicians. Their leader, Gordon Campbell said in 1999 that he wanted to create an economy that was based on winners and not losers, adding that gambling was entirely based on losers. He said that the only way that any government can make money from gambling is when voters lose it. Since coming to power, the gambling revenues taken by his government has increased by nearly a billion dollars, which means an awful lot of losers.

One of the most ironic about-turns by the government surely has to be the aggressive expansion into online gambling. It is now possible to play poker and online keno on the British Columbia Lotteries website and there are plans for more virtual casino style games to be added in the near future. This just goes to show that sometimes, no matter how much any politician publicly opposes something, when a big enough carrot is dangled it just has to be grabbed at with both hands.