Undeterred by the problems facing online gambling in British Columbia, the Canadian province of Ontario is looking into legalized gambling as a source of revenue. The cash-strapped province could rake in $500 million in windfall profits, according to the Liberal Party.

The province is facing a deficit of $19.7 billion and is looking for ways to add revenue. One possibility the Liberal-led government, including Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, is actively exploring is online gambling. Canadians living in the province are already betting on overseas casinos and the government is losing out on that revenue. By regulating and taxing an intra-province online gambling industry, the government could add an additional $500 million to the $1.9 billion the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) made in 2009.

If they open online gambling to residents of Ontario, the province could follow British Columbia’s lead and have the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation run the casino. OLG Chairman Paul Godfrey supports the idea, saying that “money is going out of this province to other provinces as well as offshore sites.”

The plan is not without its controversy, though. Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak is wary of any plan that would put the OLG in charge of a government-run online casino. Citing scandals involving suspicious lottery wins by insiders as well as other problems, Hudak asked “Who is going to trust Dalton McGuinty to run an online casino?”

The Tory leader ridiculed the Premier’s record regarding the Lottery and Gaming Corporation, saying that “this guy has had two consecutive major scandals at the OLGC, they’ve gone through five CEOs, they can’t run the existing casinos,” let alone online casinos. Hudak said that the government is looking for more and more tax money without concern for the safety of the people.

If there have been scandals involving the lottery already, putting them in charge of an online casino seems like a bad idea. Maybe letting existing online casinos operate in the province and charging them a licensing fee (and perhaps taxing them) would be a better idea. Certainly, British Columbia’s debacle with their PlayNow.com website should be taken into consideration as well.

As I reported last week, the Canadian province of British Columbia became the first jurisdiction in North America to legalize and regulate online gambling when they launched a casino on Thursday. British Columbia’s Lottery Corporation launched an online casino on their PlayNow.com website.

Now I have good news and bad news. The good news is that the new online casino has been wildly popular. The bad news is that the website is currently down. That means that online gamblers who want to play now, can’t do it at PlayNow.com.

Within a couple hours of launching the new government-run online casino, the server crashed due to being overloaded by visitors. The Lottery Corporation didn’t have an infrastructure that could handle the massive increase in traffic volume at the site. Due to that, the website is currently down and Canadian citizens eager to play their favorite online casino games can no longer do so, unless they go back to the foreign operators.

While it’s bad news that the website is down and the Lottery Corp. couldn’t handle the traffic, it’s good news that the site was so popular. Online gambling is often seen as a small issue, and in the grand scheme of things maybe it is. However, the crashing of the B.C. server shows just how popular that activity is, which is a good reason to push for further legalization throughout the rest of North America.

There is no timetable yet for a re-launch of the website. Whenever it does get back up and running, though, the Lottery Corporation can expect a large number of deposits and wagers from British Columbia residents.

Today the Canadian province of British Columbia will become the first jurisdiction in North America to legalize and regulate online gambling. Today Rich Coleman, Minister of Housing and Social Development, along with British Columbia Lottery Corporation President Michael Graydon are expected to announce 75 new online games to be launched on the BCLC’s website, PlayNow.com.

Last August, in an effort to increase revenue for the province, the government decided to increase the individual betting limit on the lottery website from $120 per week to $9,999 per week. Once that limit was increased, letting residents spend almost $10K every week on the lottery website, the next logical conclusion was to add casino games. Today we will see that next step.

The 75 new games to be added to the BCLC’s website will include online blackjack, poker, roulette and more. The websites were taken down yesterday for the switchover and are scheduled to be re-launched by noon today.

The Lottery Corp’s website will include sophisticated programs to ensure that only people of legal gambling age play the new online games and to provide security against cheating and identity theft. In addition, it will have easily accessed links to support programs for problem gambling.

In addition to establishing online casino games in British Columbia, the B.C. Lottery Corp. is working with other provinces in an attempt to bring a nationwide online gambling network to all of Canada. Already, Quebec’s lottery corporation is expecting to launch an online gambling website this fall. Other provinces may soon follow the lead of British Columbia and Quebec.