The debate on the bill that would establish a legal framework for regulated commercial online gambling in Alberta is about to get serious.

Minister Dale Nally’s Bill 48, the iGaming Alberta Act, passed at second reading on Wednesday afternoon in the legislative Assembly. It was not discussed during the floor session but was moved ahead.

The next step will be for it to be debated at the Committee of the Whole, the committee of all Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) which meets to discuss specific clauses of a bill. Whenever it is taken up in the committee, Bill 48 will be reviewed clause by clause and amendments to the content of the proposal will be considered.

From there, its potential path will take it to third reading and further debate before potential approval. So far, the sum total of discussion around the iGaming Alberta Act has comprised one dedicated hour on the Assembly floor last week, in which politicians read pre-written remarks.

What do we know?

Put simply, Bill 48 would lay the foundations for Alberta to establish an Ontario-like regulated commercial online gaming market, allowing a to-be-determined number of private-sector gaming operators to gain licenses and compete against the government-run Play Alberta platform for customers’ money.

The bill would establish the iGaming Alberta Corporation, which would be the conduct-and-manage entity, similar to the role that iGaming Ontario (iGO) plays in that province. However, the proposed legislation would make the Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis Commission (AGLC) the regulator of the province’s new iGaming market. That ostensibly means that AGLC would both regulate the market and continue to operate Play Alberta in said market.

So, any online casinos and sportsbooks wanting to do business in Alberta’s regulated market would register with the AGLC and sign an operating agreement with the new iGaming Alberta Corporation and play by the rules and standards established by both parties.

The bill also includes a provision to begin the new market with a centralized self-exclusion system in place, a tool by which gamblers can choose to ban themselves from every regulated online gaming site in one move. Ontario does not have such a system, but one is in development between iGO, Integrity Compliance 360 (IC360) and IXUP.

“A significant number of Albertans are potentially being preyed upon by grey-market sites or illicit sites,” Nally said when presenting the bill for second reading last week. “This legislation proposes to change that … Our goal is not to create new gamblers but to make existing online gambling safer. ”

What do we not know?

The answer to this question, as of right now, is “a lot.”

Bill 48 does not include a suggested tax rate or license fee or any real specifics around what would or would not be allowed in the new market, other than stipulating that companies would have to gain government approval and a licence to operate. There is not much meat on the bones around what the market would look like, what requirements operators and suppliers would have to meet or how players would be safeguarded.

Although we do know that the Alberta iGaming Corporation would be mandated to pay its “surplus” funds to the province, we don’t know how big a cut that will be.

Nally and other members of the incumbent United Conservative Party (UCP) said last week that key regulations and policies related to factors such as revenue, consumer protection and social responsibilities will be outlined later this year following further engagement with indigenous groups and industry and community leaders.

The New Democratic Party (NDP) chastized the UCP for the lack of detail, saying that with one member calling it “just like buying a car without knowing if it has brakes or a steering wheel.”

These are the things that lawmakers will look to hash out in the Committee of the Whole. It could take some time.