Lithuania is the only country in the Baltics where the games of chance are forbidden due to its moralists. It has been tried more than once to take off this restriction.

Lithuania is the only country in the Baltics where the games of chance are forbidden due to its moralists. It has been tried more than once to take off this restriction.

The situation remains the same in spite the fact that hypocrisy costs very much to the country: it doesn’t receive money it could receive (consider such an example for better orientation: Latvia has raised its budget by 25 millions Lt and Estonia by 12 millions). In fact the losses are even greater than it may seem at first because this restriction holds back the flow of tourists into Republic. That’s why the Seimas was offered the law that legalizes roulette, cards, bones, totes and bingo.

However, as it is impossible to forbid the profitable business, it exists. Press often describes cases of findings of gaming-houses. Their scale of the overspeeding is so wide that one can only imagine what incredible amounts of incomes are passing by the treasury. Furthermore in cafes and dancing halls one can see automatic devices that are considered to be and are licensed as game and computer ones despite their obviously reckless character. In Vilnius 127 licenses of such kind are given.

According to the project, gaming-houses are to be open in five cities: Vilnius, Kaunas, Klaipeda, Palanga and Nida. No games are allowed to be organized in the shops, cinemas, in the markets and stations. Only those associations the authorized capital of which varies from 1 to 4 million Lt (this depends on some factors) are allowed to organize an activity of such kind. New requirements are very strict: only new gaming-devises manufactured according to the licenses are to be used. Special counters (“black boxes”) will control money turnover and other operations. Such systems are used in Great Britain, France, Hungary, Slovenia and other countries. If the law will be accepted, the creation of the special establishment in the Ministry of Finance on supervision of this sphere is offered.

According to the experts this bill will be criticized not only by the opponents but by the proponents of the revocation of the prohibition, too: provinces will feel discriminated and businessmen will consider it to be too cruel. For the local businessmen this law is too strict; majority of the owners of the gaming devices do not fit this bill, these devices are too old. And the amount of authorized capital is too large for them. Only foreign investors can afford the business together taking all the laws and restrictions that are described in the law into account, so they will be the first who enter the market.