Constitutional Court backs gambling regulation

The Constitutional Court on Thursday scrapped a lottery law provision enabling video lottery terminal sites with a licence from the Finance Ministry to operate until the end of 2014. The court complied with a Czech town´s complaint that the provision thwarted the effective regulation of gambling by towns. The Finance Ministry will now likely have to withdraw all licences that run counter to town hall directives. The verdict may apply to as many as tens of thousands of lottery terminals, the Czech news agency reported. A day earlier, operators said they feared intervention by the court would increase illegal gambling as well as trigger a series of court disputes.