José Múcio Monteiro, Minister of Institutional Relations, who was put on pressure by trade unions to develop the approval of a proposal to regulate bingos together with the National Congress, decided to put the matter to debate in the Political Council of the Federal Government.

“I want this issue to be treated. It is something controversial, but it has to be resolved. That’s why a development is necessary, but we all have to be involved in it”, said the minister, who still has not decided if he will put the matter to be treated in the following meeting of the group”.

José Múcio strategy not only opens a space to debate on the matter, but also brings the responsibility to legislators to lead the campaign for the proposal. The minister intends to initiate discussions and analyze the opinion of the members allied to the Political Council. If they evaluate that the trend is to support the idea, Monteiro will pass the issue to the congress and will start assisting on the conversations.

Although the aim of the minister is to debate the issue before the government entered to the campaign for the regulation or to decide to shelve the issue, they agree that the bingo regulation is important for the government. They think so not only for the political impact that the decision may have in millions of workers that await for the legislation, but also because of the impact on finances and taxes.

According to calculations from trade unions, just due to tax collection, bingos should bring more than USD 1.1 billion to public coffers.

The government analyzes the proposal and thinks that the allocation of resources depends on the region. In US, for example, those resources are allocated to health.
In Brazil, the idea is that the bingo collection is allocated to the sports area.

In spite of attractive taxes, they aim to treat the matter carefully. That’s why government intends to elaborate a proposal together with trade unions and legislators, that will initially legislate just bingos.

Such care has to do with the episode that took place in 2005, in which ex consultand of the Civil House of the Government, Waldomiro Diniz, was accused of extorting money from gaming businessmen to collect money for the Partido Trabalhista (PT) political party.