Illegal casinos to be banned under new law

Up to 20 clubs in Dublin operating casinos under the guise of members' clubs may be shut down under a proposed new law.

Minister for Justice Michael McDowell will bring proposals to Government within weeks to allow prosecution of unlicensed casinos. He said today that casinos were illegal in Ireland and there was no plans to license them.

However, he said there was provision for limited forms of gaming and the operation of so-called slot machines where a resolution was passed by a local authority regarding a particular area of its jurisdiction. Such examples exist in towns such as Bray, Buncrana and Bundoran.

Mr McDowell said there was no provision in law for licensing, for example, a place where roulette or blackjack were played on a regular basis.

The Minister added that there was a concern that such operations could be used for money laundering, but he emphasised that he was not saying existing clubs were in fact being used in such a way.

"Right across the European Union there is a concern of justice and home affairs ministers that gaming is used as a way of hiding money laundering and it's international experience that organised crime gravitates towards gaming business.

"My predicament is this - that existing casinos are in my view unlawful and the guards have evidential difficulties at the moment in relation to them.

"What it is proposed to do is to make it clear . . . that there is no right in Ireland to establish a casino, good, bad or indifferent, in any circumstance, and to provide penalties for people who operate them, evidential presumptions that will assist the gardaü/span>? in prosecutions."