Dear Editor:
An open letter to Wellington-Halton Hills MP Michael Chong.
I have to bring to your attention the very disturbing circumstances of major inroads of various forms of gambling in our society.
As an elder Canadian I have watched the process starting with legitimizing casinos and wholesale lotteries assembled ostensibly to turn money over to the public in the form of funds to build sports complexes and lump sums to local townships.
Now more recently we have massive corporate lobbying and “gamblification” of sports in Canada and hiring of sports heroes to further their reach to impressionable young people and children. Further, these corporations have drawn in the sports governing bodies and even the federal judicial side of sports control.
This is all wrong because it is preying on what is, or becomes, uncontrollable vice in a portion of the population; 85% of gambling proceeds generated by these corporations is from 8% of the population and incites suicides in many that cannot control the habit.
I urge you, Michael, in your effective legislative role, to roll back laws that have allowed this uncontrolled use of vice to generate billions of dollars for these Canadian and international corporations. Disallow the hiring of sports heroes into this business and remove corporate collaboration with national sports groups and legislative groups.
As an indication of this overwhelming control gambling corporations have, you only need to watch any Canadian sports event on TV and see that every second advertisement urges use of their “convenient” gambling access to thousands of games, even displaying the odds.
Peter Little,
Fergus