Government should be outlawing the game, not the machine allowing users to play it, according to lawyer Paul Harshaw.

However as things stand right now, all computers on the Island will be deemed illegal by July 1, 2004, thanks to the Prohibition of Gaming Machines Amendment Act passed in the House of Assembly last Friday.

Mr. Harshaw said he was not trying to broadside Government. ?I don?t blame the PLP at all,? he told yesterday. ?If the UBP were doing their job (as Opposition) they would have pointed out the fundamental flaws ...Without a strong and attentive Opposition you can?t fault Government for letting it slip through. Nobody is an expert in everything.?

The Prohibition of Gaming Machines Act was first tabled in 2001, when the PLP Government under former Premier Jennifer Smith swore to protect Bermuda?s vulnerable from the dangers of gambling by banning all gaming machines by 2004.

However unforeseen changes in gaming machine technology resulted in the need to amend that act to keep up with the times.

Opposition Leader Grant Gibbons said the UBP supported the spirit behind the legislation. However, he added, his party was concerned with the ?last-minute rush? as Government raced to put the ban into effect by July 1, adding it led to concerns about the quality of the legislation.

And he said the UBP was calling for a blue-chip commission to examine gambling on the Island in general so the public would have real answers to questions about the social ills related to gambling. MPs debated the amendments for the majority of Friday?s session in the House before passing them. However, said Mr. Harshaw, the legislation remains fundamentally flawed.

The amendments essentially declare that any ?machine? (any apparatus, a computer or an electronic device) which ?may be used wholly or partly for the purpose of playing a game of chance? is illegal, and that anyone using or operating them could be liable for fines of up to a quarter of a million dollars and five years imprisonment.

?So if it?s capable of playing Solitaire,? Mr. Harshaw said, ?it?s illegal.

?That would be every computer ever built in the history of the world. They are still banning every single computer in Bermuda ... The only way to effectively ban all gaming machines is to abandon all computers.?

Government needed to target the games, not the machines, he said. ?All this means is that if somebody can figure out how to gamble without a machine, they?re in the clear.?

However there were five years of inertia behind the idea of banning machines, he said, and legislators failed to appreciate such machines were nothing more than computers.

Mr. Harshaw also noted Government was using a ?big hammer? to enforce the legislation. The amendments make using computer an indictable offence with fines of up to a quarter of a million dollars or five years imprisonment.

The amendments essentially give the Minister the power to decide what machines are to be banned, a power which is ?not unheard of, but worrying?.