Full Tilt Poker has an educational site called FullTiltPoker.net and this site has a sponsorship deal with the Sydney Roosters which is a Rugby League in Australia. The federal government has asked the Australian National Rugby League to part ways with the online poker site.
The Sydney Roosters have benefited from their sponsorship deal with Full Tilt Poker and so the National Rugby League has asked the Roosters to get legal advice concerning their sponsorship deal with the site. They do not want the team to be breaking any federal laws.
The Australian Interactive Gambling Act of 2001 does not allow foreign gambling companies that are unregulated to offer or provide their services to players in Australia. The National Rugby League issued a statement that said the league would not be pursuing a relationship with Full Tilt. The problem the government has with the partnership is that Full Tilt Poker’s information site is connected with Full Tilt Poker which offers betting and is quite popular.
“They’ve suggested we make sure that we consider the legal advice in relation to specific sections of the act,” said the Chief Executive of the Sydney Roosters, Steve Noyce. “They haven’t told us to pull the sponsorship – they’ve just told us we should look at the advice so that’s what we’re doing.”
The team has gotten legal advice and they were told that their sponsorship deal with the educational site by Full Tilt does not breach any federal laws, on the surface. Noyce commented: ‘The important thing is that we have a relationship with FullTiltPoker.net which is the education site and the sole activity of that is education and you can’t gamble on that site whatsoever. Our advice initially was that provided that we advertised the .net site then it was ok.”