Don’t give Vincent the licence. Auction it

Open it for bidding. Make them pay for it.

Don’t let them rip off the public again

Umno-BN politicians are busy helping Vincent Tan in the campaign for licensed sports betting (or bookmaking). Leading the charge is Mahathir Mohamad, the man who first allowed Malaysians to be ripped-off when he gave away to Vincent Tan on unknown terms the licence to operate Sports Toto’s Lotto games, without safeguards to ensure that the money went back to the public as a whole.

Now he wants to give Vincent Tan another crack at reaping billions from ordinary Malaysians foolish enough to fritter away their spare cash. They should not be allowed to let gambling companies leech off the Malaysian public yet again.

The public are entitled to expect no less from a government that was elected to look after the people’s interests and the nation’s interests, not the interest of towkays.

Rais Yatim the heritage minister, joining the campaign yesterday, has now floated the idea of regulation and of a trust fund for welfare works — similar to the ideas in two previous articles:

• » Real reforms are worth the gamble, and
• » Let gambling money benefit the people, not towkays

What Rais stated yesterday does not go far enough.   

Make them pay — to rent the betting licence

A sports betting licence is worth billions. So how much is Vincent Tan paying the people of Malaysia for the privilege of making enor mous profits from their foolishness in gambling?
Did the Treasury put a price on the licence?
How much? RM500? RM5,000? RM500,000? RM5 million? Compare that to the billions that can be made. Gambling is as good as a licence to print money. How much money is made by Sports Toto and Berjaya, or Damacai andTanjung, orMagnum, among others? How much are those companies worth on the stock market?
Businesses of all kinds have to pay for licences, after all. Even shop keepers have been asked to pay for a sugar licence. Mobile phone companies bid for their radio spectrum allocation. Television spectrum is auctioned, or should be, to the highest bidder. Newspaper companies pay for their permits every year.
What is the price of a bookmaking licence? Several fortunes worth.

The people own the licence. Pay up first

The rightful owners of licences are the people. Don’t sell licences. Rent them out. Instead, the federal government is trying to give away to Vincent Tan something that belongs to all the people, as the govern ment has done so many times before.
Vincent Tan has already announced he is selling his 70% share of the licence for RM525 million. His son Robin owns the remaining 25%. That means Berjaya values the full licence at RM700 million.
Licences grant the holders a temporary right to conduct business. That right comes from the people. That right is not owned by the cabinet and certainly is not the property of the Barisan Nasional. How much is Vincent Tan willing to pay the Malaysian people to rent the licence from them? How much did the government charge for the licence? Whatever he paid, if any, is not enough.

Don’t give away a monopoly. Auction the licences

Withdraw all gambling licences — the Tote, the Sweepstakes, the 4-Digit and the 3-Digit licences. Auction all of them and the book making licence as well. Open the bidding to anyone willing to take the risk.
These companies and businessmen are making money from ordinary people for doing nothing. Businessmen who want to make money should be prepared to take a risk with their own money. Make them put up or shut up.

The people of Malaysia should not allow a few favoured businessmen to make easy money out of a no-risk proposition. Will these businessmen also give the punter a no-risk guaranteed return on his bet? If not, make them wager their own money, too.
Open all gambling licences. Call for competitive bidding. Hold an open auction.

Return the money to the people

Gambling companies are non-productive businesses. They produce nothing. They deliver nothing. They are just middlemen. They collect money from foolish people, distribute it to a few people, and keep a big chunk for themselves.
Why should they profit from it? It is a hidden tax. Rich people taxing the less well-off and the poor. Don’t let them suck up the huge profits. Only allow them to earn management fees, say 10% of all bets. Even that is a huge amount. Return all the rest to the people. It’s their money.

	Sports Toto	Magnum	Damacai	TOTAL
Total bets placed by punters	* RM3,500	RM3,200	RM2,300	RM9,000
Management fee 10%	RM350	RM320	RM230	RM900
Net amount from bets	RM3,150	RM2,880	RM2,070	RM8,100
Prize money to gamblers	RM1,890	RM1,728	RM1,242	RM4,860
Returned to the people	RM1,260	RM1,152	RM828	RM3,240
As govt income tax @ 26%	RM328	RM300	RM215	RM842
As heritage contribution	RM932	RM852	RM613	RM2,398
(* from 2008 Toto accounts). Figures in RM millions, given by way of example and do not represent actual accounts.

Have strict regulation and oversight

Set up a Lotteries Commission that reports to Parliament. Have open accounts tabled in Parliament. Set limits on the terms of licences — say five or seven years each. Hold auctions at the end of the term.

Set strict limits on marketing and advertising

Gambling should be regarded in the same manner as smoking and drinking. Both activities are injurious to health. Gambling can pose a danger to families the same way as other obsessions.
Protect families and the young. Strictly regulate all marketing, advert ising and promo tional activities of gambling companies. Ban all television and press advertising. Permit only results to be advertised.
Strictly control sponsor ship of activities that relate to the young, to families, and to health. No sports sponsorship of any kind, for example. Keep them away from charities.

Protect ordinary people from the rich

That is the first and most basic task of any government. Mahathir Mohamad’s campaign, as before, will only protect and benefit the rich. Don’t let him and his friends browbeat the government and the people yet again.

© 2010 uppercaise