Nobody’s smoking the wacky tabaccy. It’s true.
Through the smoke there is some ground-breaking potential for a fresh start in the marijuana world.
First came the province’s gutsy decision to turn over pot sales to the free market instead creating a government monopoly.
Next, government should allow people who have been part of the pot game to participate — even if it means expunging or overlooking previous interactions with the law.
If Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is prepared to play ball, it could very well happen.
Two questions have emanated from the Doug Ford government’s announcement that marijuana won’t be sold through LCBO-style stores:
Could dropping all minor drug offence cases before the courts be the next shoe to drop in the liberalization of marijuana in Canada?
And could pardons for those convicted of minor drug charges be far behind?
Sources say no idea is being dismissed. Officials understand this is an out-of-the-box situation that has been thrust on the provinces.
“The charges are federal,” said an Ontario government insider. “But there will be conversations (with Ottawa counterparts).”
There are a lot of balls in the air as Canada waits for legal marijuana in October. No one is quite sure where they will land.
Pot activist Jodie Emery — who, with her husband Marc, has been arrested, jailed and had their product and cash seized — said that while she is optimistic, she will believe it when she sees it.
“I’m trying to be hopeful, but I have been betrayed and attacked by governments at every level it seems,” the so-called Princess of Pot said Tuesday.
“They don’t want to reward us or let us enjoy the fruits of our labour — those fruits go to the former cops and politicians and big business guys hijacking the cannabis culture and industry.”
This was true. But Ford’s announcement this week does open a window for this to go in a different direction.
“We have to get this right and we will not be rushed,” Finance Minister Vic Fedeli has said. “We will use this time to consult with businesses, consumer groups, public health organizations, municipalities, law enforcement and Indigenous communities.”
The biggest loser in pot not being sold in government-style stores should be the drug dealers.
It should be easier not be out priced by black market operators when the government is spared having to pay marijuana sales people $27-an-hour and offer indexed pensions. All marijuana sales will have to be from product that is high quality and government approved.
Of course, we don’t really know where Trudeau’s legalization of marijuana will lead. But Ford and Fedeli’s decision to not make it a government monopoly is a good start.
What it should mean is free enterprise, capitalism and competition — from corporations to mom-and-pop operators — kind of like the way it was a year ago before the police were used as muscle to shut down urban dispensaries that had popped up all over.
The Ford government seems to have lit the match to turning at least a piece of the pot game back to those steeped in the cannabis culture who had lobbied for these law changes for decades but then were cut out of the process by big business — led, in part, by former senior police officers who had made careers out of locking up such marijuana sellers.
Depending how the conversations go with municipalities, who can opt out all together, it could lead to the police and pot sellers actually working together on the same team against the black market.
If it happens, the world really will have gone to pot.
Through the smoke there is some ground-breaking potential for a fresh start in the marijuana world.
First came the province’s gutsy decision to turn over pot sales to the free market instead creating a government monopoly.
Next, government should allow people who have been part of the pot game to participate — even if it means expunging or overlooking previous interactions with the law.
If Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is prepared to play ball, it could very well happen.
Two questions have emanated from the Doug Ford government’s announcement that marijuana won’t be sold through LCBO-style stores:
Could dropping all minor drug offence cases before the courts be the next shoe to drop in the liberalization of marijuana in Canada?
And could pardons for those convicted of minor drug charges be far behind?
Sources say no idea is being dismissed. Officials understand this is an out-of-the-box situation that has been thrust on the provinces.
“The charges are federal,” said an Ontario government insider. “But there will be conversations (with Ottawa counterparts).”
There are a lot of balls in the air as Canada waits for legal marijuana in October. No one is quite sure where they will land.
Pot activist Jodie Emery — who, with her husband Marc, has been arrested, jailed and had their product and cash seized — said that while she is optimistic, she will believe it when she sees it.
“I’m trying to be hopeful, but I have been betrayed and attacked by governments at every level it seems,” the so-called Princess of Pot said Tuesday.
“They don’t want to reward us or let us enjoy the fruits of our labour — those fruits go to the former cops and politicians and big business guys hijacking the cannabis culture and industry.”
This was true. But Ford’s announcement this week does open a window for this to go in a different direction.
“We have to get this right and we will not be rushed,” Finance Minister Vic Fedeli has said. “We will use this time to consult with businesses, consumer groups, public health organizations, municipalities, law enforcement and Indigenous communities.”
The biggest loser in pot not being sold in government-style stores should be the drug dealers.
It should be easier not be out priced by black market operators when the government is spared having to pay marijuana sales people $27-an-hour and offer indexed pensions. All marijuana sales will have to be from product that is high quality and government approved.
Of course, we don’t really know where Trudeau’s legalization of marijuana will lead. But Ford and Fedeli’s decision to not make it a government monopoly is a good start.
What it should mean is free enterprise, capitalism and competition — from corporations to mom-and-pop operators — kind of like the way it was a year ago before the police were used as muscle to shut down urban dispensaries that had popped up all over.
The Ford government seems to have lit the match to turning at least a piece of the pot game back to those steeped in the cannabis culture who had lobbied for these law changes for decades but then were cut out of the process by big business — led, in part, by former senior police officers who had made careers out of locking up such marijuana sellers.
Depending how the conversations go with municipalities, who can opt out all together, it could lead to the police and pot sellers actually working together on the same team against the black market.
If it happens, the world really will have gone to pot.
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