MEDICAL MARIJUANA PROGRAM IS UNCONSTITUTIONAL

To The Editor:

Re: Northumberland residents help create nation's first medical marijuana
expo (Feb. 25).

There is much about this program that the government doesn't talk
about, and it has been an ongoing fiasco for almost a decade. Here are
some things that Canadians need to know about the medical marijuana
program at Health Canada

* The program itself has been ruled unconstitutional by at least four
court rulings

- - The program is so scandalously understaffed that there is a 16-week
wait for applications to be processed (whereas it only takes a few
weeks to get a gun). Simple renewals take 10 weeks.

- - The rules on plant and storage limits are arbitrary and do not
reflect the realities of pot cultivation, making them difficult - and
sometime impossible - to comply with.

- - Police often ignore the fact someone has a permit to grow, and tear
out the plants and damage equipment regardless of the legality.

- - Though more doctors are signing, many refuse to sign - not because
of marijuana - but because of the onerous, dysfunctional, and
unconstitutional nature of the Health Canada program.

- - The pot grown by the government is weak, ground up, is full of stem,
seed, leaf, and chemicals. It doesn't even look like pot, it looks
like the stuff you sprinkle on the floor to soak up vomit. It is also
$5 per gram, which is an outrage because it is sub-standard, and it
has already been paid for by taxpayers.

- - The federal regulations "allow" the permit holder to possess and use
marijuana, but provincial laws forbid the simple possession of
cannabis in a variety of locations, like busses, cars, restaurants,
bars, and just about everywhere else, which places the permit holders
in a legal conundrum.

- - The program was put in place to prop up a prohibition that was ruled
unconstitutional. Since the prohibition on marijuana is
unconstitutional, and the program that props it up is
unconstitutional, that (technically) makes pot legal for anyone who
uses it for medical purposes - even without a license. The problem is,
our systematically corrupt judiciary and government flatly ignore
these previous rulings, and have been prosecuting and convicting
people for almost a decade with a dead law.

- - If a grower loses a crop to bugs or fungus, which can happen even in
the cleanest facilities, patients can be left with little to no
medicine for months at a time. If they try to buy the government pot
as a "back up" until their own garden produces something useful, they
must relinquish their grow permits. There is no back up, there is no
middle ground, and this can leave patients with no legal way to obtain
medicine for months at a stretch.

It should also be noted that since the regulations were never enacted
as a law, technically, participants in the program are under no legal
obligation to adhere to them, nor do the police or government have any
legal jurisdiction to enforce them.

We are all living in a grey area where marijuana is not yet legal, but
no longer illegal.

Russell Barth

Licensed medical marijuana user

Nepean, ON