On September 9, the Budget Committee (BC) in the Chamber of Deputies (CHoD) continued to discuss the new tax package for 2021 and the amendment to the AML Act and the Gambling Act (GA), which passed the first reading in the Chamber before the summer holidays. Together with the secretary of the IFGR, my colleague Petra Ďurovičová, I personally participated in this meeting and observed the discussion of all the amendments related to our field of gambling.
As part of the tax package 2021 (Press No. 910), we expected that a possible motion to the amendment would be made to correspond to the previously-announced increase in gambling taxes (for fixed-odds betting and totalizator bets – an increase from the current 23% to 25%, and for live play and bingo – from 23 % to 30%), which has been repeatedly mentioned by the Minister of Finance in recent days and weeks. Several amendments were submitted, but the good news is that the one concerning the increase in the gambling tax has not yet been submitted. The tax package was approved by the BC yesterday with several amendments, but without the increase in gambling taxes.
Unfortunately, according to our information, the Ministry of Finance continues to consider the increase in the gambling tax internally and is evaluating its effects. Given that the amendment cancelling the super-gross salary announced by the Minister has not yet been submitted, the Ministry will most likely submit some in the second reading of the discussion of these acts in the CHoD. The second reading should take place at the next meeting of the CHoD, which will start next Tuesday, i.e. 15 September, at 14:00.
During the discussion of the amendment to the AML Act and the GA (Press No. 909), four amendments to the AML Act and none to the GA were submitted at the Budget Committee. Amendments were submitted by MPs Volný (ANO), Juránek (KDU-ČSL), Stanjura (ODS) and Kovářová (TOP 09).
We consider the following to be particularly interesting:
- Amendment of MP Juránek proposing the elimination of a new possibility of remote identification of players based on two documents without the need for physical verification. However, it did not go through.
- Amendment by Mr Stanjura, whose text is not yet publicly available, but it was announced at the BC meeting that it concerns the extension of remote identification methods. We will therefore try to obtain its wording and inform you about its impacts.
In the end, the BC approved the amendments to the AML Act and the GA, as amended by MPs Volný as well as MP Stanjura.
Regarding the fact that the above-mentioned acts should enter into force no later than 1 January 2021, there is not much time left. According to our information, next week is the last opportunity to present possible further amendments in the legislative process, that is directly in the second reading in the CHoD. It cannot be ruled out that the Ministry of Finance would deliberately choose this procedure to make everything happen quickly and without the possibility of interfering in the process in any significant way. However, we continue to monitor the whole process in detail and will inform you about it.
Furthermore, we would like to inform you that according to information from yesterday’s personal meetings with representatives of the Ministry of Finance, the live environment of the Register of Excluded Persons should be launched next week, which will take full effect this year, or rather on 20 December 2020. According to the information, we assume that the Ministry will organize a media event for such an occasion with the Minister being present there.
