cannabisnews.com: Stop Throwing Cash Into Pot Policing: Senator





Stop Throwing Cash Into Pot Policing: Senator
Posted by CN Staff on September 27, 2002 at 10:16:23 PT
By Sean Gordon
Source: Montreal Gazette 
Marijuana prohibition is a costly failure and the federal government shouldn't throw good money after bad by increasing law-enforcement budgets, says the chairman of a Senate committee that recommends the drug be legalized.Senator Pierre-Claude Nolin said the only way to stem drug use in Canada is to approach substance abuse as a public-health issue, not a policing one.
"Penal measures have their place. But why do they take up so much room in our drug strategies? They are of limited use, and they create more negative effects than benefits," said Nolin, who yesterday addressed a plenary session of World Forum 2002, a conference on drugs and dependencies taking place at the Palais des Congrès."Some might say it's immoral to allow children access to psychoactive substances. It's also immoral to encourage organized crime by making those substances illegal," he said.Nolin admitted legalization of marijuana probably would increase the number of users, but suggested any increase would be short-lived. He argued that legalization would afford more control over marijuana than current laws allow, and would also allow for more effective prevention methods.Nolin also pointed out that so far, laws haven't deterred the estimated 225,000 Canadians age 12 to 17 who smoke pot regularly."We're not promoting the use of marijuana, we're simply acknowledging it," he said.Daniel Sansfaçon - who served as the Senate committee's director of research - told the plenary that the utopian idea of a drug-free society is dead and gone, and that laws and policy need to take social realities into account.The report, recently made public, was panned by several major law-enforcement associations, including the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police.Snipped: Complete Article: http://www.canada.com/montreal/news/story.asp?id=F1BD21AA-878C-4AF0-A517-95DA372C8E3FSource: Montreal Gazette (CN QU)Author: Sean Gordon Published: Friday, September 27, 2002Copyright: 2002 The Gazette, a division of Southam Inc.Contact: letters thegazette.southam.caWebsite: http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/Related Articles:Canada Explores Legalizing, America Escalates Warhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread14230.shtmlCanada's Pot Policy Under Fire from U.S.http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread14095.shtmlLegalize Marijuana, Senate Committee Sayshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13989.shtml 
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Comment #3 posted by The GCW on September 27, 2002 at 11:56:36 PT
Would it lower hard drug use ?
Nolin admitted legalization of marijuana probably would increase the number of users, ...My question is: Would it lower hard drug use ? 
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Comment #2 posted by Sam Adams on September 27, 2002 at 10:27:04 PT
He's right about Pharm
Don't the US companies pay Australia and Tasmania to grow their opium for them?  Meanwhile poor people in Columbian and Afganistan get sprayed. Nolin overlooked the obvious - people in South America and the Mideast are brown, and the people in Australia are white!  US policy has to be simple at its root, or the Republicans couldn't understand them.
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Comment #1 posted by Sam Adams on September 27, 2002 at 10:23:17 PT
Look out! Honest politician on the loose!
the rest:Several police officers at this week's conference have said the government needs to enact stiffer sentences for pot growers and dealers, and pour more money into "supply control" to enforce existing laws."It's our job to apply the law as it exists," Inspector Freddy Foley of the Sûreté du Québec told a workshop on Tuesday."If society gets its act together and decides we no longer want these laws, fine. Until then, we have to enforce the law, and right now we don't have all the means to do it adequately."Nolin's conclusions have also drawn fire from other quarters, as was evidenced during the question-and-answer session that followed the plenary.Federal Justice Minister Martin Cauchon has stopped short of endorsing the Senate committee's recommendations, but he has suggested legislation could be tabled as soon as this fall to decriminalize marijuana possession.Nolin, a Conservative appointed to the Senator in 1993 by Brian Mulroney, also took the international community to task for continuing to support anti-drug laws."We can blame international treaties. These treaties penalize countries in the southern hemisphere that produce source plants, but they encourage production of chemicals from those same plants by pharmaceutical countries in the north."sgordon thegazette.southam.ca
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