Gambling licensing seen as “most important cultural political issue” for Norway’s Progress Party
Himanshu Gulati has reaffirmed the party’s commitment to campaigning for an end to the state monopoly on gambling in Norway.
Norway.- The right-wing populist Progress Party (FrP) has restated its commitment to campaigning for an end to the state-controlled monopoly on gambling in Norway. Speaking at the Norwegian Online Gaming Association’s annual Spillkonferansen, the former MP Himanshu Gulati expressed confidence that a change of government would bring a shift to a licensing model.
He called for a debate on gambling policy, criticising what he described as entrenched assumptions about gambling harms and revenue.
“I have for many years said internally in my party that when there’s a change of government, the licensing model for gambling must be the most important cultural political issue for the Progress Party,” Gulati stated during his keynote remarks at the conference.
Gulati pointed to earlier reforms championed by the Progress Party, including the legalisation of cash poker, lifting restrictions that allowed athletes such as boxer Cecilia Brækhus to compete domestically, and scrapping Norway’s Segway ban. “Some of the current rules and restrictions are, in my opinion, contrary to all common sense,” he argued.
“The question is whether the model we have had for all these years still generates the most money for the purpose,” he added.
The FrP has argued for a regulated licensing system since 2021. It remains one of the smaller political forces, although it has been making gains, winning 48 seats (24 per cent) in Norway’s last general election in September 2025.
Gambling in Norway remains the preserve of state-owned Norsk Tipping and the horseracing betting operator Norsk Rikstoto. However, with Finland now taking online gambling licence applications, Norway will soon look like even more of an outlier in gambling in Western Europe, with only Luxembourg and Iceland retaining comparably restrictive frameworks. Norsk Tipping in particular has been subject to considerable criticism in recent years due to a series of oversight failings and technical blunders.
Nevertheless, the dominant political parties in Norway continue to defend the monopoly model, which they see as more responsible. Regional authorities are also generally opposed to any change due to the funding that Norsk Tipping provides for sports. The gambling regulator Lotteritilsynet recently argued that the monopoly system was working amid a drop in participation in unlicensed offshore gambling.
That said, the Progress Party is not entirely alone in calling for an end to the monopoly system. Tage Pettersen and some other members of the conservative Høyre party have said that they are personally in favour of such a move, but they have not been able to convince the party as a whole to adopt the policy as a manifesto pledge.
