The casinos make a date in London and confirm the Eca board
Members of the European Casino Association (Eca) met in London on 24 January 2012 for the association's General Assembly. The Eca General Assembly 2012 was attended by Eca members from 22 countries who met to discuss key industry topics including recent and upcoming gambling regulatory and policy developments at EU level. 2011 proved a very busy and exciting year with publication of both the European Commission Green Paper as well as the European Parliament Report on online gambling. The Eca continually provided input, ensuring the voice of Europe's legal gaming industry was heard. Over the course of 2012, the association will carefully monitor progress of Eu policy development in anticipation of the European Commission's Communication on gambling expected later this year.
Written by Anna Maria Rengo
At the General Assembly, reports were also given on progress made in the Eca's five Working Groups, in which Eca members participate on a voluntary basis to focus on a range of industry-relevant topics, ranging from the Eca Slot Summits (the first of which is to be held in Hanover, Germany on 20-22 March 2012) through to corporate social responsibility and responsible gaming and prevention of illegal gambling activities and money laundering.
Board elections were held with six out of seven board seats up for election as set out in the association's statutes. Members elected Guido Berghmans from Luxemburg, Bruno Cagnon from France, Heliodoro Giner from Spain, Ron Goudsmit from The Netherlands, Matthias Hein from Germany and Dietmar Hoscher from Austria to the Eca board and confirmed the re-appointment of Ron Goudsmit as Chairman and Guido Berghmans as the Vice Chairman of the association. On the contrary th0e Italian Carlo Pagan, CEO of the Casino di Campione and president of Federgioco, was not competing, because he joined the Eca board last June (at the Summer Meeting held in Campione d 'Italia) so its three-year term will expire in June 2014.
Ron Goudsmit, Chairman of the Eca, congratulated the Working Groups on the progress made: "Thanks to the commitment and proactive efforts of our members, it has been a highly productive year. In 2012, we will continue to promote Eca objectives, using our highly effective information network to contribute to consultations and represent industry interests at European level."
Eca will promote a lot of the next events: in addition to the mentioned slot Summit, that will take place in April in Helsinki, Finland, the European Croupier Championship (and this time, differently from the past year, also an Italian team will compete), while the Summer Meeting 2012 will have Nova Gorica, Slovenia as location in June.