LEGALIZED MARIJUANA BILL DOOMED

'Poison Pill' Amendment Expected To Kill B.C. MP's Private Bill

OTTAWA - A B.C. MP's bill aimed at decriminalizing marijuana possession is
expected to be killed today by a so-called "poison pill" amendment by the
Liberal government

The amendment, if passed, will kill Canadian Alliance MP Keith Martin's
bill even though an all-party, Liberal-controlled committee agreed last
year that it would go to a vote.

Martin, a medical doctor, is one of the few MPs who has been able to get a
private bill into the House of Commons for a scheduled vote. Under a
complicated lottery system, only a handful of the hundreds of private bills
ever make it that far.

He used the opportunity to advance a cause recently endorsed by the
Canadian Medical Association - that those caught with small amounts of
marijuana be subjected to tickets and fines, but not criminal prosecution
and a record.

Martin said decriminalization would free up the police and courts to deal
with more serious drug-related offences.

"This bill would save Canada $150 million every year, as well as freeing
manpower and resources within the police," he said.

But Martin's bill is expected to be stopped in its tracks today as a result
of a Liberal amendment that was tabled shortly after former Justice
Minister Anne McLellan was replaced in January by Martin Cauchon.

While McLellan had urged a public debate on marijuana decriminalization,
Cauchon said he wouldn't entertain any changes in Canada's pot laws because
Canadians wouldn't support such measures.

Liberal MPs are being urged to vote in favour of a government amendment
that would remove Martin's bill from the order paper, but would at the same
time refer the issues raised in his legislation to an existing special
committee now studying the non-medical use of drugs.

Government House leader Ralph Goodale said if Martin's bill passed second
reading today unchanged, it would go to the justice committee for study.
Then the House of Commons would have two groups of MPs studying the same issue.

While Goodale said he's been on the job only four months and couldn't
respond to charges the tactic is unprecedented, he said the procedure is
legal and is simply intended to avoid parliamentary bottlenecks.

"It's not denying the rights of private members, not at all," Goodale said
Tuesday. But opposition MPs urged "cowering" Liberal backbenchers to join
with other parties in defending the rights of ordinary parliamentarians
against Chretien's manoeuvres.

Martin said government and opposition MPs currently have 239 bills before
the House under a private member's process estimated by the Canadian
Alliance to cost $45 million a year.

None of the bills have made it to the Commons for a vote and only three
private bills from the Senate have passed. The three involved symbolic or
trivial matters such as the creation of a parliamentary poet laureate and
the designation of a national horse of Canada.

"None of the private member's business that is substantive, productive, or
important to Canadians is even allowed to get on the floor of the House of
Commons" Martin told reporters.

"Canada Is Becoming A Dictatorship."

Other MPs agreed, saying the Liberal government is taking on an
unprecedented step to stifle parliamentary democracy, MPs, who have had the
ability since the mid-1980s to occasionally send their own bills to the
Commons for a vote, have effectively lost that right, said veteran New
Democratic Party House leader Bill Blaikie.

"This is a very, very bad precedent," said Blaikie. "Whenever the
government doesn't want something to come to a vote, it can use its
majority to overcome private members' business. This indeed will be a sad
day for parliamentary democracy."

Tory House leader Peter MacKay said Prime Minister Jean Chretien, already
accused of wielding dictatorial powers over Parliament, is destroying one
of the few ways MPs can advance the views of their region.

"This is a major step backward, It kills the ability of members of
Parliament to do work on behalf of their constituents and on behalf of
their country and province," MacKay said.