LEGAL POT HAS B.C. MPS ON COLLISION COURSE

You won't find two more disparate souls on the marijuana and drug debate
than MPs Randy White and Libby Davies.

White is the Alliance boot-camper from conservative Abbotsford. Davies is
the NDP harm-reduction advocate from Vancouver's drug-plagued Downtown
Eastside.

Both sit on a House committee studying the non-medical use of drugs. Both
have heard a parade of witnesses, but that's where the similarity ends.

In the wake of the superb and thoroughly-researched Senate report calling
for legalization of marijuana, White claimed his committee heard a
different story from its witnesses.

Their general consensus "is that legalization is not the route to follow,"
he said.

Nonsense, Davies told me yesterday from New Brunswick when I asked if that
was her interpretation of the hearings.

"No. I haven't counted the witnesses, but no, no, no."

The "police lobby" was opposed, Davies admitted, but plenty of other
speakers were open to progressive change.

"What I heard across the country is a very strong message that Canada's
laws and policies on the non-medical use of drugs is completely unrealistic.

"There were many witnesses who at least called for decrim-inalization, and
some went further and called for legalization."

Perhaps White was absent when those people testified. Whatever, the
clashing realities of committee members will make it difficult to achieve
consensus in the final report due November.

It now has added significance. Justice Minister Martin Cauchon says the
country isn't ready for legalization, but he appears willing to consider
decriminalization -- after he sees what the committee recommends.

White is clearly opposed to legalization and the Senate's proposed amnesty
for those convicted of possessing marijuana. He'll be pushing for increased
police resources and more treatment.

Davies wants much more, something akin to the "very bold and courageous
step" of legalization taken by the senators.

"I think that's what we should be saying, but I don't know if a majority of
the committee will go along. I think at the very least we should be going
for decriminalization . . .

"I'm going to push like hell to make it a truthful report," she added.
"Prohibition is a totally failed strategy both in economic and human costs.

"I want to strongly emphasize harm-reduction, and the heroin prescription
program" used so successfully in European cities such as Zurich and Frankfurt.

Davies said she thinks the committee's majority Liberal members "are quite
OK with that," having seen during a June visit to Europe "that what they're
doing is a lot more pragmatic and realistic in terms of drug policy than
what we've got here in North America."

She even suggested White "understands that the current status is
ridiculous. I think he gets that. I think the difficulty he's got is that
politically he can't admit it."

Certainly not, having allied himself so closely with the police lobby,
which was red-veined in outrage at the Senate.

David Griffin of the Canadian Police Association fumed that "there are too
many politicians playing scientist" -- and then trotted out his own quackery.

"There is no such thing as the safe use of illicit drugs, including
marijuana." Griffin then went on to list the horrors of the weed:

"Marijuana disrupts functions of the brain, impairing judgment,
concentration, and short-term memory as well as the ability to perform
normal tasks."

Were Griffin to look around any police lounge in Canada, he'd find the rye
and beer being quaffed has exactly the same effect. So why aren't the
police calling for a return of Prohibition?

Because they learned 80 years ago that it doesn't work. Nor does it work
for pot.