Canada's Supreme Court Hears Ontario's Cross-Border Poker Case on 7 October

Ontario and Alberta, the only two provinces with open markets, will argue alongside Flutter, GGPoker's parent and the Canadian Gaming Association that pooling poker and fantasy players with other jurisdictions is lawful under the Criminal Code. Four Crown lottery corporations say it is Ontario conducting gaming outside Ontario. Every other province's monopoly turns on the answer.

• The Supreme Court of Canada will hear the appeal against Ontario's cross-border liquidity reference on 7 October 2026, Lottery Daily reports; the attorneys general of Ontario and Alberta, Flutter Entertainment, NSUS Group and the Canadian Gaming Association have filed to present oral argument
• The appellants are the Atlantic Lottery Corporation, the British Columbia Lottery Corporation and Manitoba Liquor and Lotteries, joined by Loto-Québec in April; the Mohawk Council of Kahnawà:ke withdrew from the appeal in June
• The Ontario Court of Appeal ruled 4-1 last November that the Criminal Code does not require every player to be physically in Ontario provided the province "conducts and manages" the gaming offered to its residents, which would let Ontario poker and daily fantasy players play against users outside Canada
• The lottery corporations argue that a game with one side outside the province is Ontario conducting gaming outside Ontario, which the Code does not permit a province to do
• Alberta, whose market launched on 13 July after years of asking whether Ontario's model could travel, joined on Ontario's side because the outcome is of "significant interest" to its own market, Attorney General Mickey Amery said; Alberta supports pooling with other provinces as well as other countries, provided all parties consent
• The case follows the coalition's appeal in April of a ruling that approved cross-border play

What the Court Is Being Asked

Ontario referred one question to its Court of Appeal in 2024: whether, under the Criminal Code's provision that allows a province to "conduct and manage" lottery schemes, iGaming Ontario may let players of peer-to-peer games, online poker and daily fantasy sports, play against people outside the province. The Code's exception for provincial gaming is the legal foundation of every Canadian market, monopoly and open alike, and it has always been read to require that the gaming happen in the province.

The Court of Appeal answered yes, by four judges to one. As long as the Ontario side of the game is hosted, regulated and controlled by the province, the majority held, the gaming is conducted in Ontario, and the location of the counterparty does not change that. Poker operators had argued that a province-only pool is too small to sustain tournaments and cash games at the level offshore sites offer, and that the Code was never meant to decide the size of a poker table.

The four lottery corporations, which run the only legal online gambling in their provinces, appealed. Their argument is that a hand of poker with one player in Toronto and one in Manchester is not a game conducted in Ontario; it is a game conducted partly outside Ontario, and Ontario has no power to conduct gaming anywhere else. They also say it is not academic: an Ontario pool open to the world could be open, in practice, to their own residents, and the Code gives each province exclusivity within its borders precisely to prevent that.

Who Is Arguing

On 7 October the court will hear from Ontario, from Alberta, from Flutter, which owns PokerStars and FanDuel and is the largest peer-to-peer operator in Ontario, from NSUS Group, the parent of GGPoker, and from the Canadian Gaming Association. Alberta's involvement is new. Its regulated market opened in July, its poker and fantasy products face the same liquidity problem Ontario's did, and Amery's filing said the province backs cross-border play "whether these are other countries or other Canadian provinces, as long as all parties consent". That last clause is the interprovincial version of the same question: whether Alberta and Ontario could pool with each other, which the Code's exclusivity provisions have been read to forbid.

The Kahnawà:ke Mohawk Council, whose gaming commission has licensed offshore operators for decades and which initially opposed cross-border play, withdrew from the appeal in June.

This Is the Case That Decides Whether Canada Has One Market or Ten

Ontario's open market is four years old and Alberta's is two months old. The other eight provinces run monopolies whose legal footing is the same Criminal Code exception Ontario is asking the court to read broadly. A ruling for Ontario does not open those provinces, but it removes the argument that a province's gaming must stop at its border, and Alberta has already said what it would do with that. A ruling for the lottery corporations confines every Canadian poker player to their own province indefinitely, and confirms that the monopolies' borders are constitutional rather than commercial.

The Lottery Corporations Are Defending More Than Poker

Peer-to-peer play is a small part of Ontario's revenue. What the appellants are protecting is the principle that a province's gaming is territorial, because that principle is what stops Ontario's licensed casinos and sportsbooks from serving Quebec or British Columbia. Loto-Québec joined the appeal in April while fending off a domestic campaign to open its own market; it needs the Supreme Court to say that Ontario cannot reach across the line, whatever Ontario's Court of Appeal thought.

Alberta Has Changed the Arithmetic

When the coalition appealed in April, Ontario stood alone against four provinces. With Alberta on the other side, the court is being asked to referee between two groups of provinces rather than to check one outlier, and Alberta's brief puts interprovincial pooling on the table explicitly. The Supreme Court tends to answer the question it is asked and no more; Alberta has made sure the question is bigger.

Ontario asked whether its players may leave the province. On 7 October, nine judges will hear whether Canada's provinces can.