PASSING THE BUCK AGAIN

Anne McLellan is the Latest Minister to Hand Judges a Hot Potato

When the book is eventually written on Jean Chretien's government, medical
marijuana will deserve a long, sorry chapter.

For the government's first seven years in power, ministers refused even to
talk about the issue. It was only when the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled in
2000 that it was unconstitutional to force someone to choose between using
marijuana for legitimate health reasons and violating a Criminal Code that
made no exceptions for medical use of marijuana that the government began
to move. It had to, after all, or the whole marijuana law would have been
struck down.

A licensing system was set up to give approved patients the right to
legally possess marijuana. A supply of the drug was promised, but it never
materialized. Instead, some patients grew their own, some turned to
non-profit clubs set up by compassionate growers, and many others were
forced to buy theirs from street dealers.

On Monday, federal Health Minister Anne McLellan told the Canadian Medical
Association she is "uncomfortable" with supplying marijuana as medicine
until clinical trials are completed using the most rigorous scientific
methods. Of course, there's already a great deal of research showing the
medical benefits of marijuana, but the research hasn't been done to the
most exacting standards. In part, that's because the Liberal government
hasn't done the research during its nine years in power.

Still Ms. McLellan claimed to be optimistic that things will move along. "I
hope this whole issue gets before the Supreme Court of Canada fairly soon
so we will have the opportunity to re-argue this case before the Supreme
Court so we can get some clarity about what is happening."

Yet, if the government seriously wanted the Supreme Court to rule quickly
on the issue, it simply had to appeal the original 2000 decision that set
off the whole chain of events. But it didn't. And who was the minister of
justice who decided not to appeal? Anne McLellan.

From the beginning, the government's strategy on medical marijuana has
been delay, delay and delay some more. And then, perhaps, somewhere down
the road, the Supreme Court will rule that the sick and dying may not be
denied a drug that gives them relief. Then, with court ruling in hand, the
government will be able to shrug and say to the opponents of medical
marijuana, here and in the United States, we have no choice. It's those
darned judges.

There's a 20-year-old pattern here. From the inclusion of sexual
orientation in the Charter of Rights, to abortion, euthanasia, pornography,
same-sex marriage and medical marijuana, many ministers have refused to
deal honestly with explosive social issues that cut across party lines.
Their first instinct is to dodge and delay. Then they dump the issue on the
courts, leaving it to judges to take the heat.

Ms. McLellan told the CMA she is "not insensitive to those who feel
(marijuana) helps in their final days or acute-illness situations." And yet
the effect of the government's delaying tactics is that many more sick and
dying human beings will either be denied this small relief or be forced to
turn to the black market for it. It is to the government's shame that it
would do this to the most vulnerable among us.