Late adoption of the Law on Games of Chance: The state loses 120.000 euros per month

The state budget loses at least 120.000 euros per month due to the failure to adopt amendments to the Law on Games of Chance.

Amendments to the law were made at the session of the Assembly on April 25. This institution explained to "Vijesta" that the sessions, according to the collegium's agreement, will continue after the local elections on May 25.

At the postponed session, there are 22 more bills that await the return of deputies from "vacation" to their jobs.

The changes, which the Committee for the Economy proposed to the Parliament at the beginning of April, and which have been talked about since July last year, envisage an increase in the fixed concession by 30 percent for betting shops and machines, 50 percent for casinos and the introduction of a concession for lottery games of 65.000 per year to the Black Lottery. Gore, which has not paid her until now.

The changes were proposed by a group of DPS deputies.

Fixed monthly concessions are paid only by bookmakers, EUR 500 per bookmaker place, and machine clubs EUR 50 per machine. By amending the law, these amounts would be increased by 150 and 15 euros.

According to data from the website of the Gaming Authority, there are now active concessions for 475 sports betting sites and 126 payment terminals.

When the total number is multiplied by 150 euros, an additional monthly amount of 90.150 is obtained. In automatic clubs, according to data from the end of last year, there are 1.988 machine clubs, so their new amount would be worth 29.820 euros per month.

In the Law on Games of Chance, it is written that casinos pay the concession until the end of December of the current year for the following year, therefore, the existing six casinos have paid the concession at the old amount until the end of the year.

The annual concession would be increased from 50 to 75, but it would depend on the opinion of the Ministry of Finance whether the casinos would pay part of the difference for this year for the remaining part of the year.

The opinion of the Ministry would also be necessary for a new concession to the Lottery in order to pay part of the annual amount of 65.000 euros for this year.

The increases in fees for games of chance were supposed to replace the income from the abolished taxes "euro for euro" for the state.