The Buenos Aires commission drafts a single text on online gambling
In the Buenos Aires Chamber of Deputies, the Committee on Gambling, Lottery, and Problem Gambling Prevention advanced with the drafting of a unified bill for virtual betting platforms, with the protection of minors against digital problem gambling as its declared focus. Its president, Micaela Olivetto, emphasized the need to achieve a comprehensive text instead of continuing to discuss isolated initiatives.
The first pillar is access. The text aims to impose validations that prevent minors from accessing legal sites and, for adults who already bet, to add protection mechanisms and an alert system. The second pillar is exposure, with limits on advertising and rules on social media promotion, mass media, and sports sponsorships. The third is to directly block platforms operating without authorization, a universe that, according to the committee itself, accounts for a significant volume of the market.
Funding is organized into two funds. One directs resources to the Ministry of Health and municipalities for three defined uses: training professionals, supporting families, and providing comprehensive mental health assistance. The other goes to strengthening community and sports institutions. Olivetto insisted that a comprehensive tool from the Legislature is needed because the problem, she said, is affecting the mental health of children, and she described the situation she sees in the province, with addiction, indebtedness, and very sad suffering among residents.
The session also included a visit from the other chamber. The guest was Senator Laura Clark, who presented her Senate bill aimed at establishing an educational awareness program on problem gambling in Buenos Aires schools for primary and secondary students. According to the committee's schedule, the next step is technical: Gonzalo Atanasof, who presides over the Provincial Institute of Lottery and Casinos, will sit before the deputies on Monday, October 19, when he will have to answer regulatory, technical, and oversight questions.
The design of the two funds is the decision that most warrants observation. The province will finance the treatment of problem gambling and, with the same revenue, the strengthening of clubs and community institutions, which are simultaneously the main advertising supports for the sector in the territory. This is not necessarily a conflict, because a club with its own infrastructure depends less on sponsorship, but it requires the law to state the criteria by which these resources are allocated so that the second fund does not end up compensating the same entities whose advertising revenue is cut by the advertising chapter. The other point is architectural and comes from the previous discussion in this same committee: the province is building two responses in parallel—friction on the legal channel, with validations, alerts, and session limits, and blocking on the illegal channel—so the effectiveness of the package will depend on both moving at the same pace. There is a precedent that should be kept in mind when it comes time to vote, and that is that this same legislature has been discussing a much broader package on Buenos Aires gambling since the beginning of the month, so the committee's unified text must fit with what is being discussed in the chamber and not replace it. Monday's appearance is precisely the point where this is measured, because the administrator of the provincial lottery is the only one who can say how much of what is proposed can be overseen with the existing structure and how much requires tools that the province does not yet have.
Tags: Buenos Aires Province, Problem gambling, Online gambling regulation, Micaela Olivetto