THE BILL to allow for casino gambling in Jamaica will be among the first to be debated when Parliament returns from its summer break next month.

Prime Minister Bruce Golding told a Gleaner Editors' Forum that the debate on the casino bill will take place immediately after the House of Representatives examines and approved the Supplementary Estimates for the 2009-2010 fiscal year.

Golding has included the Charter of Rights among the top items which will be debated when the House resumes. He said he would soon sit with Leader of Government Business, Andrew Holness, to determine the full raft of legislation which members of parliament will be asked to examine and debate.

Commission

The casino bill, which was tabled in July, proposes to establish a commission to regulate casino gaming in Jamaica.

Golding said he was very encouraged after meeting with one of the groups slated to invest in Jamaica's casino industry.

"I am excited by how they are excited and I have given them an undertaking that we will try to have that legislation as soon as possible when Parliament resumes in September," Golding said during the forum held at The Gleaner's North Street, central Kingston, offices last week.

The casino bill proposes that the casino-gaming component should be no more than 20 per cent of the total investment in any approved, integrated resort development.

The legislation would provide for penalties ranging from $50,000, for failing to deliver a licence that has lapsed or ceases to be effective, to $50 million for removing seals or devices of like nature from the gaming machines.

Meanwhile, Golding has said the Government is seeking consensus with the Opposition to make constitutional amendments.

He said the debate on the Charter of Rights would begin in September but expressed fear that some proposed constitutional amendments might not become the subject of parliamentary debate unless there is concurrence from the Opposition People's National Party.

"Mr A.J. Nicholson (opposition spokesman on justice) seems now to be attaching to any package of constitutional changes, including the Charter of Rights, some government agreement in relation to the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) and the Privy Counsel, almost making it a condition," Golding said, while making reference to the position being advanced by the leader of opposition business in the Senate.

He added: "If they (the Opposition) maintain that position, we are going to have to see what are those areas that we have agreed on which we can implement without their support and go ahead with those. What we would not seek to do is to make the changes that they have opposed."

The PNP has said that it would rather if the Charter of Rights be adjudicated upon by the CCJ rather than the Privy Council. However, the governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) has said it would only replace the Privy Council as Jamaica's final court of appeal if the people so decide by way of a referendum.

daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com