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EndProhibition

NDP Leadership Candidates' Responses to End Prohibition Survey

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 01/25/2012 - 2:26pm

End Prohibition is a national group of New Democrats working to end the prohibition on marijuana and stop Canada's failed war on drugs.

Founded in 2004, our group now has over 1200 members nationwide and we’ve had a presence at over two dozen provincial and federal NDP conventions across Canada.

Over the past decade, resolutions supporting drug policy reform have been passed by the NDP provincially in BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and the Yukon.

As NDP Leader, Jack Layton said he was in favour of reforming our country’s cannabis laws, and creating a legal environment where adults can enjoy cannabis without having to worry about being criminalized. Read more »

Fiorito: Omnibus crime bill’s unintended consequences

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Mon, 02/20/2012 - 1:40pm

By Joe Fiorito, Toronto Star

The omnibus crime bill is a freight train of unintended consequences. Here are some examples:

By increasing the penalties for the production of marijuana, many small-time growers — people who are unlikely to take a bigger risk — will get out of the game.

The unintended consequence?

When the small fry leave, the field becomes bigger and more profitable for the hard-core growers, the professional gangs who know how to protect themselves, and who are thus in a position to reap big financial rewards when the price of pot rises.

The bad guys get richer?

I’d say that’s an unintended consequence. Read more »

Why a former B.C. attorney-general is supporting the pro-pot movement

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Mon, 02/20/2012 - 1:37pm

By ROBERT MATAS, Globe and Mail

Geoff Plant has felt for years that the prohibition of marijuana is wrong. Now that the former B.C. attorney-general is out of government, he has decided it's time to push for the legalization of the drug.

“I have always had a problem with the idea that the state should criminalize an act which is essentially no more complex than putting a couple of seeds in your back yard, waiting a while and then, when something grows, you put it in your pocket, you chew it or you smoke it,” Mr. Plant said.

Last week, Mr. Plant joined three former NDP attorneys-general to support a campaign against federal legislation that would impose mandatory minimum sentences for minor, non-violent marijuana-related offences. Read more »

Pot activist to challenge Canada's drug laws

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Mon, 02/20/2012 - 1:34pm

BY ROBERT KOOPMANS, DAILY NEWS

A Kamloops medical marijuana activist says he will challenge Canada’s drug laws as unconstitutional after being charged with trafficking.

Carl Anderson was charged by the federal Crown last week with possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking. The charges stem from a Kamloops police search of Anderson’s Tranquille storefront. Drug officers searched the store Nov. 1, seizing several boxes of items, including growing and dried marijuana.

Anderson is scheduled to appear in provincial court to face the charges Feb. 20. A federal Crown prosecutor from Vancouver is expected to appear here to handle the file. Read more »

NDP agrees changes needed to pot laws

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Thu, 02/16/2012 - 4:49pm

By Jeremy Deutsch - Kamloops This Week

A recent letter signed by four former B.C. attorneys general calling for the legalization of cannabis appears to have support from both sides of the political spectrum in Kamloops.

Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Kevin Krueger said he respects and supports the decision by Premier Christy Clark to leave the issue up to the federal government, but personally agrees with the letter.

He compared the fight against marijuana to the battle Americans waged against alcohol in the 1920s.

It’s a battle he believes the country is losing. Read more »

Harm reduction for the whole community

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Thu, 02/16/2012 - 4:46pm

By Jonas Gagnon - Caledonia Courier

Humanizing Harm Reduction, a regional harm reduction conference, will be hosted here in Fort St. James/Nak'azdli from March 6 to 8.

The conference is designed to take a larger view of harm reduction than what normally comes to mind.

"We've tried to have a pretty broad focus of harm reduction. The focus is on just that, reducing harm, whether it's seatbelts or a helmet. A lot of people, when they think of harm reduction, it's just around safe injection sites, but harm reduction does have a bigger scope," said Jo Anne Alexander, the Public Health Nurse at Northern Health and a member of the committee running the conference. Read more »

Scientists take tour of Vancouver’s poorest postal code

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Thu, 02/16/2012 - 4:43pm

By ERICA BULMAN, 24 HOURS

A group of scientists were toured through “Canada’s poorest urban landscape” on Wednesday, to learn how Vancouver deals with the homeless and drug-addicted in the Downtown Eastside.

“We were looking at urban problems that exist all over the world that Vancouver has been successfully addressing,” said Russell Maynard of the Portland Hotel Society. “Probably most succinct to the tour today were addiction and mental health issues in low-income area. One doesn’t cause the other but they all have close correlated relationships.

“The goal today was to show them how Vancouver has some very unique ways of dealing with this.” Read more »

Pierre-Claude Nolin and medical marijuana

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 02/15/2012 - 3:49pm

By: Dale Smith, Xtra News

Conservative Senator Pierre-Claude Nolin is taking a stand against the Harper government by opposing Bill C-10, the omnibus crime bill.

A lawyer before Brian Mulroney appointed him to the Senate in 1993, Nolin has studied drug policy for more than a decade. His criticism of C-10 stems largely from his belief that the prohibition of marijuana in this country needs to end. He has declined to give press interviews on the matter, but he has outlined his position on several occasions, most recently in a December 16 speech on C-10 at the bill’s second reading in the Senate. (The complete text of the speech is included in the original article). Nolin focused on the plight of medical marijuana users, who have remained in a legal grey zone since 1997 when the Supreme Court struck down some parts of The Controlled Drug and Substances Act (CDSA). Read more »

Marijuana decriminalization supported by former B.C. attorneys-general

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Tue, 02/14/2012 - 3:46pm

BY MIKE RAPTIS AND IAN AUSTIN, THE PROVINCE

Four former B.C. attorneys-general have added their authoritative voices to the call for the decriminalization of marijuana.

Former B.C. Premier Ujjal Dosanjh, along with Geoff Plant, Colin Gabelmann and Graeme Bowbrick, added their experience as the province’s top legal authority to legalization.

“As former B.C. attorneys-general, we are fully aware that British Columbia lost its war against the marijuana industry many years ago,” write the four, who collectively served as attorneys general from 1991 to 2005, a critical period of time when public perception of pot smoking changed dramatically.

“The case demonstrating the failure and harms of marijuana prohibition is airtight. Read more »

Premier leaving marijuana debate to federal government

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Tue, 02/14/2012 - 3:42pm

Sean Leslie, CKNW

Premier Christy Clark is rebuffing a call from a group of former B.C Attorneys-General to support the legalization of marijuana.

That call comes in a letter to both Clark and NDP leader Adrian Dix from Colin Gabelmann, Ujjal Dosanjh, Graeme Bowbrick and Geoff Plant.

"I am going to leave the marijuana debate to the federal government,” Clark said today. “It’s in their sole role, sole sphere of responsibility. So as a Premier I respect that former Attorneys-General have taken this stand, people who are outside of politics, but as a Premier I’m going to leave this to the federal government."

Clark did not answer when asked if she has smoked pot. Read more »

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