Thailand is consulting on a change to a 1935 gambling law that would let people under 18 play and train at snooker and billiards, which the rules have barred them from since 1960.
The same draft would move the supervision of boxing promoters to the Sports Authority of Thailand.
The Department of Provincial Administration opened the consultation on Thursday, October 22, and it runs to November 22 on the government’s legal portal at law.go.th.
The rules being amended are Ministerial Regulation No. 17 of 1960, issued under the Gambling Act of 1935.
Billiards has been a recognised professional sport in Thailand since the Professional Sports Promotion Act of 2013, which has left the two sets of rules pointing in opposite directions.
Under the regulation as it stands, nobody below the age of majority may play or train at it. The amendment would allow both, under conditions that have not been set out.
On boxing, the regulation still refers to the Department of Physical Education and to provincial education offices.
The draft would replace those with the Sports Authority, either supervising promoters directly or certifying them, to line the rules up with the Boxing Act of 1999.
Deputy government spokeswoman Ploythalay Laksameesangchan said the aim was to remove outdated legal restrictions and bring the rules into line with how sport is now run and with the laws written for individual sports.
The consultation is required before the draft goes further, under a cabinet resolution of January 10 this year and the 2019 law on drafting and evaluating legislation.
Nothing changes while it runs. The department has not said when a final draft would go to the cabinet, and the conditions under which minors could play have not been published.
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