“The existence of sports betting in Brazil is already a reality,” says Viana. “We now need to regulate it, with great transparency, so that the benefits arising from the generation of formal jobs and the collection of taxes can be reverted to the entire Brazilian population,” he commented after being announced as rapporteur.
The leader of the government in the Chamber, José Guimarães, again said that the government hopes to raise R$ 12 billion (US$ 2.46bn) with the taxation of sports betting. The mayor, Arthur Lira, reinforced that the deputies will dedicate themselves in the next fifteen days to discuss the project.
The deadline for the Bill to be voted on without locking the agenda is September 9th. According to the regiment, bills that are processed due to constitutional urgency, if not analyzed, lock the agenda 45 days after it is received by the House.
Lira also reinforced that the idea is for the text to be restricted to sports betting, without covering other gaming verticals. “Jogo do bicho and casino are in the Senate, waiting for the designation of a rapporteur, also for almost two years,” said Lira. He intends to discuss the issue with the chairman of the Senate Constitution and Justice Commission, Davi Alcolumbre.
“We are not going to include other games of chance in the bill because there is already a specific one for that in the Senate. Unless there is a great agreement to put the text that the Chamber approved and put it back in the urgent project, which will force the Senate to discuss the matter. But that didn't even cross the minds of the leaders and I didn't hear anything about it in relation to the government,” explained Lira.
The idea of the Planalto Palace is to approve the bill in Congress within the term of the PM, that is, within four months. As a result, the provisional measure may lapse without the taxation of bets being reversed.
The strategy serves the Executive, by allowing immediate taxation - since PMs take effect as soon as they are published -, which guarantees an increase in government revenues, and also benefits the Chamber, by circumventing the impasse over the rite of processing of provisional measures.
Source: GMB
