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Five legislative committees in Argentina have forwarded a proposal to ban virtually all advertising for online gambling. 

The Chamber of Deputies’ commissions on Addiction Prevention and Drug Trafficking Control, Social Action and Public Health, Communications and Information Technology, Criminal Legislation and Families, Children and Youth voted on Wednesday (November 13) to approve proposed restrictions on gambling advertising after multiple hearings.

The proposal will now move to the Chamber of Deputies for further discussion.

The majority opinion of the joint commissions, which received 90 votes among members, was more specific and more restrictive than an alternative proposal endorsed as a minority opinion. 

The majority proposal goes as far as listing every site that would not be allowed to run advertising from sports and online betting operators. 

It would also forbid using social media influencers or other public figures such as athletes for promotions, alongside introducing a ban on billboard advertising and welcome bonuses. 

The proposal would also forbid the sponsorship of sports teams by gambling companies.

The commission’s opinion further calls for biometric controls to prevent minors’ access to online betting platforms, daily deposit limits and a ban on credit-card deposits.

The political parties who presented the minority opinion were concerned with limiting freedom of expression. Their alternative proposal was more vague, saying advertising should not be allowed “both directly and indirectly, through any means of dissemination or communication”.

The minority opinion’s main proponent, Deputy Silvana Giudici, called the majority opinion “too regulatory and extensive, which makes it difficult to evaluate the constitutionality of the measure". 

“What we are not going to do is move forward on issues that could harm other rights, such as freedom of expression and content on the internet. We do not think that social networks should be regulated in this specific way because this opens the door not only to trying to limit conduct such as the promotion of online gambling.”

The commissions’ final session was heated, with deputies exchanging insults and Giudici publicly accused of being in the pocket of online gambling operators. 

It did not escape the attention of irked deputies that Juan Batista Ordoñez, who was appointed Argentina’s secretary of childhood, adolescence and family last week, once served as the country manager of Spanish gambling operator Codere.

Deputies critical of the proposed full gambling ad ban said such a move would conflict with other national policies, citing a recent decision from the National Securities Commission that teenagers from age 13 can invest in the capital market and set up relevant accounts. 

The joint commissions were convened in the spring by Mónica Frade, the president of the Chamber of Deputies Commission for the Prevention of Addictions, who declared that online gambling was “breaking up families and teenagers”.

Argentina, on both a federal and provincial level, has been battling youth involvement in gambling in the past few months. The issue has become a political lightning rod in a country facing childhood poverty rates of 57.5 percent. 

Frade said that she is hopeful that the majority opinion will be discussed on the floor of the Chamber of Deputies before November 30, when the legislature will close for the summer and Christmas holidays.

After a bill is approved by the Chamber, it also would have to be passed by the Senate.