Pubdate: Fri, 07 Mar 2014
Source: North Shore News (CN BC)
Copyright: 2014 North Shore News
Contact:  http://www.nsnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/311

POT SHOTS

Forgive us if we find the Conservatives' attitude toward marijuana is 
getting a little hazy. This week we learned that some in the party 
say they are ready to discuss issuing fines for simple possession, 
rather than criminal charges.

But starting April 1, the thousands of sick Canadians who have earned 
certification from Health Canada to grow their own medicinal pot will 
become criminals if their plants are not destroyed. Those who didn't 
have the wherewithal to grow their own could buy from licensed 
dispensaries, but those too have been scrapped in favour of a system 
of delivery by mail from a handful of big companies. Medicinal 
marijuana users and their advocates have warned this is going to 
price many sick people out of access to what is often the only 
symptom relief they can find.

Despite having a system that worked for thousands of people in need, 
the Tories saw fit to scrap it because too many people were taking 
advantage and getting licences for bogus reasons. Vancouver's police 
have signalled they have no intention of shifting resources to 
enforce the new laws, and rightly so.

Thanks to the Conservative's tough-on-crime legislation, being caught 
with as few as six pot plants carries a mandatory minimum prison 
sentence of six months. Because the one thing our already overcrowded 
prisons need, apparently, is more cancer patients.

Thankfully, that mandatory minimum law will likely be struck down by 
the courts as unconstitutional, as they have for so many others in 
the last two years.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom