Pubdate: Fri, 22 Apr 2016
Source: Buffalo News (NY)
Copyright: 2016 The Buffalo News
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/GXIzebQL
Website: http://www.buffalonews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/61
Author: Alan Freeman, Washington Post

CANADA TO INTRODUCE BILL TO ALLOW MARIJUANA SALES

OTTAWA - The Canadian government announced this week it will 
introduce legislation next year to decriminalize and legalize the 
sale of marijuana, making Canada the first G7 country to permit 
widespread use of the substance.

The announcement was made Wednesday by Canada's health minister, Jane 
Philpott, at a U.N. drug conference in New York. It follows through 
on a promise made during Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's successful 
election campaign last fall.

Full legalization will make pot available in a way similar to 
alcohol. That could encourage Americans, particularly those in border 
areas, to pop over for a puff or two.

Philpott said details of the legislation are being worked out, but 
she vowed that the government "will keep marijuana out of the hands 
of children and profits out of the hands of criminals."

With the Liberals holding a majority in the House of Commons, the 
marijuana legislation is likely to pass. The path toward the 
legalization of marijuana is the latest in a string of policy 
announcements from Trudeau, 44, that have moved Canada to the left 
after a decade of Conservative Party rule, including last week's 
unveiling of legislation to permit assisted suicide.

Trudeau, whose new government remains extremely popular, has long 
been associated with the marijuana legalization issue. While an 
opposition party member in Parliament, Trudeau admitted to occasional 
use of marijuana. "I think it's five or six times that I've taken a 
puff. It's not my thing," he told reporters at the time.

The Conservative Party attempted to use that statement as proof that 
Trudeau was a political lightweight and a pothead. In the 2015 
election, the Conservatives ran ads in ethnic newspapers falsely 
alleging that Trudeau backed the sale of marijuana to children

The attack ads failed, in part because most Canadians no longer see 
the legalization of marijuana as a problem. A recent survey by Nanos 
Research, an Ottawa public opinion firm, showed that 68 percent of 
Canadians "support" or "somewhat support" legalizing marijuana and 
only 30 percent are opposed.

Unlike in the United States, where marijuana regulation is shared by 
the states and the federal government, in Canada the issue falls 
almost solely under federal jurisdiction. Marijuana use has been 
expanding since a court ruling in 2000 allowed Canadians to possess 
and grow small amounts for medicinal reasons.

Already, Ontario's provincial premier, Kathleen Wynne, has 
volunteered that the provincially owned liquor monopoly would be 
happy to sell the drug. Canada's major drugstore chains have said 
that they would like to get in on the business, too.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom