OPEN MIND ON POT, ROCK SAYS AFTER GROW-OP TOUR

OTTAWA - Health Minister Allan Rock says he has an "open mind" on
calls to decriminalize marijuana and welcomes an upcoming review of
the contentious matter by a Commons committee.

Rock made the comments Thursday, after he toured an underground mine
in Flin Flon, Man., where the first official crop of
government-sanctioned pot is being grown. The so-called medical
marijuana will be made available to sick Canadians who are granted
government approval to smoke it for the alleviation of pain.

Rock said Canada's medical marijuana policy -- which is far more
liberal than other countries -- is based on "compassionate" grounds
and he predicted it will eventually be matched by other nations
around the world.

"I'm absolutely convinced we've made the right choice," he
said.

Rock noted that members of Parliament decided in May to establish a
special committee of MPs that will begin cross-country hearings this
fall.

The committee is expected to review whether Canada's legal approach to
marijuana possession should remain unchanged, whether the drug should
be legalized, or whether it should be decriminalized -- a compromise
that would ensure the use of pot remains illegal but that the
penalties would be less severe.

"They might look at that option, they might look at other options,"
said Rock. "I don't know. And I've got to tell you -- I've got an open
mind."

Rock said that when he was federal justice minister for four years, it
was his job as attorney general to pay lawyers "to go into court and
prosecute drug cases" -- even though many involved prosecutions
against "young kids" who possessed small amounts of pot.

"The question often arose as to whether that was a good use of
dollars, whether it's a good use of the criminal justice system and
whether some other approach might be taken which would reflect
society's views, perhaps differently."

One possible approach, Rock suggested, would be to treat possession
of marijuana like a traffic offence, in which the offender would be
slapped with a ticket and a fine.