While football clubs and other registered societies that wanted to run slot machine operations were required to apply for a private lottery permit from police, a condition of the permit only required that entry and use of the slot machine rooms be restricted to members only, but a check by The Straight Times revealed that memberships could be purchased for as low as $5 in comparison to the $100 entrance fee of casinos at the time. As Members of Parliament and gambling counsellors warned that these venues provided an easy and accessible outlet for gambling and after having been called a "back door" for addicts banned from the casinos by Pastor Billy Lee, a founder of Blessed Grace Social Services, a call for an urgent review of the regulations governing these private slot machine clubs was made by MP Seah Kian Peng, the Government Parliamentary Committees chair for Social and Family Development.
