Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-11-14-Speech-2-401"
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"en.20061114.39.2-401"2
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"Mr President, would you allow me to make a point first, before you start the clock. According to the agenda, this debate was scheduled to start at 10.30. That was quite clear and I notice that a number of my colleagues made an effort to be here at 10.30. So I am disturbed to find that I missed most of the speech of my colleague Mrs McCarthy, because the debate appears to have started
ten minutes early. I do not think that is acceptable, if I may say so, and I am sorry that your predecessor in the Chair has gone away. If the schedule for the day says a debate starts at 10.30, I submit to you that it should start at 10.30, even if there has to be a short adjournment.
Perhaps I could now move on and if you will restart the clock, please, I shall make my substantive points.
I very much welcome the fact that Mr McCreevy is here to address this issue and I am pleased that, under the leadership of Mrs McCarthy, we have taken an initiative that I hope will shed some light on this issue. As the Commissioner made clear, this is a highly sensitive issue and it involves many aspects of public interest. But nevertheless, from the point of view of the operation of the Single Market, which is also of overriding interest to us, the situation is, as you suggested, deeply unsatisfactory.
Clearly we await the results of your investigations but I suggest that, at the very least, it would be appropriate for you to issue some form of guidelines to Member States on their attitude to receiving applications from reputable and well-established gambling operators who simply want to be able to operate in other EU countries under the law of those countries, which they are perfectly entitled to do. One of the things you did not mention, but which seems to me to be rather extraordinary in terms of discriminatory practice, is that some Member States have tried to restrict access to those markets on the grounds that they do not want to encourage gambling. Yet at the same time those Member States are promoting participation in their national lotteries with billions of euros across Europe. Clearly that is entirely inconsistent. I believe it is sensible and good that the European Court of Justice has struck down some of the restrictions, but I think those guidelines will be important. As Mrs McCarthy said, in terms of operation and protecting the public interest respectable operations are extremely important.
The big issue that we have to face is online gambling. Whether Member States want to preserve a monopoly or not, the fact is that consumers are taking advantage of online gambling. I believe it is much better, in the public interest, that we have well-regulated online gambling services than uncontrolled services which come into Europe from other countries outside the remit of the European Union."@en1
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"at least"1
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