Mandryk: Saskatchewan must address Ontario’s “illegal” online betting

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No one is expecting Premier Scott Moe to one day call on his marshals to bust up Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s office and shut down Ontario’s “illegal” online betting racket, which has muscled into Saskatchewan.

But there is a precedent … sort of. And there is an “illegal betting” problem in Saskatchewan today.

First, though, a recent history lesson on illegal gambling in Saskatchewan … or at least, more recent than the days when Moose Jaw was a den of iniquity, allegedly hosting Al Capone.

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In the wee hours of March 22, 1993, RCMP carrying assault weapons and clad in black attire and balaclavas burst through the doors of the White Bear Resort Golf Club House, which had been converted into the new Bear Claw casino a month earlier.

The resistance from the seven or eight terrified casino staff — presumably the reason RCMP officers thought they needed dogs, helicopters, road blocks and a tactical assault strategy — was something less than expected.

The handful of employees were locked in a back room as blackjack tables were smashed and slot machines leaking quarters were carted out to a waiting semi-trailer. Outside, band councillors, including Whitebear Chief Bernie Shepherd, were charged with operating an illegal gaming establishment.

That set off a pitched battle between First Nations and the then-NDP government, which was already heavily into the money-making business of VLTs and burgeoning government-run casinos.

It was a mess, but what emerged from the bumbling and acrimony was a thriving gaming industry and eventual partnership between the Saskatchewan Indian Gaming Authority (SIGA) and the Government of Saskatchewan/Crown Investments Corp. (CIC) managing the province’s publicly own gaming opportunities.

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How successful? Consider CIC’s annual report for 2023-24; it reported $152 million in dividends transferring back to the General Revenue Fund (GRF) to pay for nurses, doctors, teachers and road repair. (With $854 million in Crown dividends in past five years, is anyone surprised we aren’t talking about privatizing profitable utility Crown Corporations?)

And nowhere was public ownership more successful last year that at Lotteries and Gaming Saskatchewan (LGS), which made $305 million in 2023-24, providing the largest single dividend payment to the GRF of $136 million.

So we’re now decades past those ugly squabbles with First Nations over issues of gaming jurisdiction. And the aforementioned LGS good fortune combined with the fact that SIGA recorded a record $138.8-million profit in 2023-24 shows that there’s plenty of gambling profit to go around.

Everyone at the the table is a winner, right? Well, not quite, say CIC officials.

Saskatchewan gaming could be raking in even more if Ford wasn’t muscling in with his hockey goons like Wayne Gretzky and Connor McDavid, illegally shaking down Saskatchewan fans for their last online betting dime.

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Private sports betting websites like BetMGM — TV sport watchers cannot escape their ads, like the one with McDavid hammering the puck as Gretzky cheers — have been legal in Ontario since April 2022 … but only in Ontario.

They are “technically illegal” in Saskatchewan, CIC officials reminded us during a briefing last week.

Moreover, they are cutting into the profits of LGS, created a year ago to better deal with the swell of the private Ontario-based “illegal” betting sites available to anyone here who can download an app. (In fact, Gaming Minister Laura Ross made a point of noting at the last unveiling of LGS that its “PlayNow” betting program is the province’s only “legal” online betting site.)

“Technically illegal” gambling? Cutting into gaming profits that could be paying bills or going to worthy charities here at home? Given our political history, one’s ears surely perk up when one hears such words.

Well, it is of interest to CIC and government officials, who say there are plans for further discussions with the Ford government as to how to deal with this “grey area.”

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This likely won’t mean storming into Doug Ford’s office and busting up his furniture. Lessons have been learned … like sharing gaming profits.

Nevertheless, Saskatchewan does need to address the “illegal gaming” problem Ontario has created.

Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.

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