LEGAL MADNESS

In August 2002, then-federal justice minister Martin Cauchon, in a
speech to the Canadian Bar Association, asked why our society devoted
so many of our legal resources to the prosecution of cannabis
offences and whether these prosecutions actually improved the safety
of our communities.

The question remains valid because of the failure of the former
Liberal government to move ahead with the decriminalization of
possession of small amounts of marijuana.

The result is that police are once again arresting scores of
Canadians on a criminal charge that was within days of being removed
from the Criminal Code.

It is a sorry waste of police time; enforcing a law against a
relatively benign drug that should not be on the books. But the
people who deserve our utter disdain are the politicians who lack the
political will needed to finish the job Mr. Cauchon started in 2002.

Some people no doubt will point in alarm to recent news about the
prevalence of pot-smoking in Canada. According to a United Nations
report, if it can be believed, Canadians are inhaling at a rate four
times that of any other industrialized nation.

But during the period when pot was in legal limbo as the
decriminalization bill was being debated, use of pot by Canadian teens fell.

Thirty-seven years ago the groundbreaking LeDain Commission
recommended that simple possession no longer be a criminal offence.

If, in 2007, the federal government can't bring itself to legalize
marijuana, which we support, it should at least decriminalize it.