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Liberals to announce marijuana will be legal by July 1, 2018

The Liberal government will announce legislation next month that will legalize marijuana in Canada by July 1, 2018.

CBC News has learned that the legislation will be announced during the week of April 10 and will broadly follow the recommendation of a federally appointed task force that was chaired by former liberal Justice Minister Anne McLellan.

Bill Blair, the former Toronto police chief who has been stickhandling the marijuana file for the government, briefed the Liberal caucus on the roll-out plan and the legislation during caucus meetings this weekend, according to a senior government official who spoke to CBC News on condition of anonymity.

Bill Blair, parliamentary secretary to the minister of justice, briefed the Liberal caucus on new marijuana legislation, which leaves the provinces to decide how marijuana is distributed and sold, according to a senior government official. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

Provinces to control sales

The federal government will be in charge of making sure the country’s marijuana supply is safe and secure and Ottawa will license producers.

But the provinces will have the right to decide how the marijuana is distributed and sold. Provincial governments will also have the right to set price.

While Ottawa will set a minimum age of 18 to buy marijuana, the provinces will have the option of setting a higher age limit if they wish.

4 plants per household

As for Canadians who want to grow their own marijuana, they will be limited to four plants per household.

Legalizing marijuana was one of the more controversial promises Justin Trudeau made as he campaigned to become prime minister.

But in their platform the Liberals said it was necessary to “legalize, regulate and restrict access to marijuana” in order to keep drugs “out of the hands of children, and the profits out of the hands of criminals.”

The Liberals had promised to introduce legislation by the Spring of 2017. Announcing the legislation the week of April 10 will allow the party to hit that deadline.

Raids raise questions

Trudeau referred again to that rough timetable a few weeks ago when he said the legislation would be introduced before the summer. But at the same time he also warned that it wasn’t yet open season for the legal sale of marijuana.

“Until we have a framework to control and regulate marijuana, the current laws apply,” Trudeau said in Esquimalt, B.C. on March 1.

That warning became more concrete a week later, when police in Toronto, Vancouver and other cities carried out raids on marijuana dispensaries and charged several people with possession and trafficking, including noted pot advocates Marc and Jodie Emery.

Trudeau’s promise to legalize marijuana was seen as one of the reasons for the Liberals’ strong showing among youth voters in the 2015 election.

But at the NDP’s leadership debate in Montreal Sunday, which was focused on youth issues, several of the candidates pointed to marijuana legislation as an example of a broken Liberal promise.

Marijuana could be legalized by 2018 Canada Day

“I do not believe Justin Trudeau is going to bring in the legalization of marijuana and as proof that … we are still seeing, particularly young, Canadians being criminalized by simple possession of marijuana,” said B.C. MP Peter Julian.

Federal marijuana legislation to be introduced in spring 2017, Philpott says

Corrections

This story has been updated from an earlier version that, due to an editing error, incorrectly stated Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made his comments about the timing of legislation in Halifax. In fact, he made his March 1 comments in Esquimalt, B.C.

Mar 27, 2017 1:13 PM ET

With files from Canadian Press

4/20 FAQ for the cannabis high holiday

Published: Apr 20, 2017, 11:14 am • Updated: Apr 20, 2017, 11:17 am

By Gene Johnson, The Associated Press

SEATTLE — Today marks marijuana culture’s high holiday, 4/20, when college students gather — at 4:20 p.m. — in clouds of smoke on campus quads and when pot shops in legal weed states thank their customers with discounts.

This year’s edition provides an occasion for pot activists to reflect on how far their movement has come, with recreational pot now allowed in eight states and the nation’s capital, as well as a changed national political climate that could threaten to slow or undermine their cause.

Here’s a look at the holiday’s history.

Why 4/20?

The origins of the date, and the term “420” generally, were long murky. Some claimed it referred to a police code for marijuana possession or that it arose from Bob Dylan’s “Rainy Day Women No. 12 & 35,” with its refrain of “Everybody must get stoned” — 420 being the product of 12 times 35.

But in recent years, a consensus has emerged around the most credible explanation: that it started with a group of bell-bottomed buddies from San Rafael High School in California, who called themselves “the Waldos.” A friend’s brother was afraid of getting busted for a patch of cannabis he was growing in the woods at Point Reyes, so he drew a map and gave the teens permission to harvest the crop, the story goes.

During fall 1971, at 4:20 p.m., just after classes and football practice, the group would meet up at the school’s statue of chemist Louis Pasteur, smoke a joint and head out to search for the weed patch. They never did find it, but their private lexicon — “420 Louie,” and later just “420” — would take on a life of its own.

The Waldos saved postmarked letters and other artifacts from the 1970s referencing “420,” which they now keep in a bank vault, and when the Oxford English Dictionary added the term last month it cited some of those documents as the entry’s earliest recorded uses .

How did ‘420’ spread

A brother of one of the Waldos was a close friend of Grateful Dead bassist Phil Lesh, as Lesh once confirmed in an interview with the Huffington Post. The Waldos began hanging out in the band’s circle, and the slang spread.

Fast-forward to the early 1990s: Steve Bloom, a reporter for the cannabis magazine High Times, was at a Dead show when he was handed a flier urging people to “meet at 4:20 on 4/20 for 420-ing in Marin County at the Bolinas Ridge sunset spot on Mt. Tamalpais.” High Times published it.

“It’s a phenomenon,” said one of the Waldos, Steve Capper, now 62 and a chief executive at a payroll financing company in San Francisco. “Most things die within a couple years, but this just goes on and on. It’s not like someday somebody’s going to say, ‘OK, Cannabis New Year’s is on June 23rd now.’”

Bloom, now the editor in chief of Freedom Leaf Magazine, notes that while the Waldos came up with the term, the people who made the flier — and effectively turned 4/20 into a holiday — remain unknown.

How is it celebrated?

With weed, naturally. Some of the celebrations are bigger than others; Hippie Hill in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park typically draws thousands. In Seattle, the organizers of the annual Hempfest event are anticipating about 250 people at a private party. Some pot shops are offering discounts or hosting block parties.

College quads and statehouse lawns are also known for drawing 4/20 celebrants, with the University of Colorado’s Boulder campus historically among the largest gatherings — though not so much since administrators started closing off the campus several years ago. Generally, 4/20 events in Colorado have dropped off significantly since the state legalized recreational use in 2012.

Some breweries make 4/20 themed beers — including SweetWater Brewing in Atlanta, whose founders attended CU-Boulder. Lagunitas Brewing in Petaluma, California, releases its “Waldos’ Special Ale” every year on 4/20 in honoring of the term’s coiners; it’s billed as “the dankest and hoppiest beer ever brewed at Lagunitas.”

The politics

This year’s 4/20 follows successful legalization campaigns in California, Nevada, Maine and Massachusetts, which join Alaska, Colorado, Oregon and Washington as states that allow recreational marijuana. More than half the states allow medical marijuana.

But it remains illegal under federal law. Attorney General Jeff Sessions this month ordered a review of marijuana policy to see how it may conflict with the President Donald Trump’s crime-fighting agenda, and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly recently called marijuana “a potentially dangerous gateway drug that frequently leads to the use of harder drugs.” That’s a view long held by drug warriors despite scant evidence for its validity.

Sixty percent of adults support legalizing marijuana, according to a Gallup poll last fall, and two-thirds of respondents in a Yahoo/Marist poll released this week said marijuana is safer than opioids.

Undermining regulatory schemes in legal pot states could prompt a backlash that would hasten the end of federal prohibition, said Vivian McPeak, a founder of Seattle’s Hempfest.

“We’re looking at an attorney general who wants to bring America back into the 1980s in terms of drug policy,” McPeak said. “I’m skeptical they can put the cannabis genie back into the bottle.”

What does it mean?

McPeak says 4/20 these days is “half celebration and half call to action.”

For the Waldos, who remain close friends, it signifies above all else a good time, Capper says.

“We’re not political. We’re jokesters,” he said. “But there was a time that we can’t forget, when it was secret, furtive. … The energy of the time was more charged, more exciting in a certain way.

“I’m not saying that’s all good — it’s not good they were putting people in jail,” he added. “You wouldn’t want to go back there. Of course not.”

Associated Press writers Kristen Wyatt in Denver and Sadie Gurman in Washington, D.C., contributed.

Follow Gene Johnson at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

Canada Marijuana Legalization: Feds Looking To Set Up Cannabis Tracking System

Justin Trudeau’s Liberals have kept many of the promises they made on the campaign trail but others have fallen by the wayside. Here’s a look at some of the bigger election pledges abandoned by the Trudeau government (so far). (Information courtesy of The Canadian Press)

Liberals pledged to usher in a new electoral system in time for the next election, guaranteeing that the 2015 vote would be the last conducted under first-past-the-post. That plan was abandoned in February 2017.

Run deficits of less than $10 billion in each of the first three years of the mandate, still reducing the debt-to-GDP ratio each year and balancing the books in the final year. The Liberals’ inaugural budget projects deficits for at least five years, totalling $113 billion, including almost $30 billion this year alone. The government still hopes to lower the debt-to-GDP ratio over the course of the mandate. (Photo: Trudeau and Finance Minister Bill Morneau)

The tax break for middle-income earners was to be “revenue neutral,'” paid for by hiking taxes on the wealthiest one per cent. In fact, it will cost the federal treasury $1.2 billion a year.

Reduce the small business tax rate to nine per cent from 11 per cent. (Photo: Small Business Minister Bardish Chagger)

Maintain funding levels for the Canadian Armed Forces. The government pushed back $3.7 billion for new equipment to 2020. (Photo: Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan)

Immediately scrap the planned $44-billion purchase of F-35 stealth fighter jets, launch open and transparent competition to replace the current CF-18 fighter jets and reallocate the savings to the navy. The government now proposes to buy a handful of Super Hornet aircraft as a stopgap measure.

Immediately invest $3 billion over four years to improve home care. This promise is now tied to negotiations with the provinces and territories on a new health accord. (Photo: Health Minister Jane Philpott)

Cap how much can be claimed through the stock option deduction on annual gains higher than $100,000.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s verbal promise to “restore” door-to-door home mail delivery. The government is committed only to stopping any further reduction in home delivery while it conducts a review of Canada Post’s operations.

UP NEXT: Trudeau’s Selfies

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, shown here taking a selfie with a child on Parliament Hill in October 2015, is no stranger to posing for a photo. Though Conservatives have given him a hard time over the practice, Trudeau says it’s all about staying connected to people. Click through this gallery to see more times Trudeau indulged a request for a selfie..

Trudeau poses with a crowd in Bridgetown, N.S. on August 16, 2016.

Trudeau poses with an elder after receiving a ceremonial headdress while visiting the Tsuut’ina First Nation near Calgary, Alta., Friday, March 4, 2016.

Trudeau poses after a youth Q&A with Mexico’s President Enrique Pena Nieto at the Museum of Nature, on Tuesday, June 28, 2016 in Ottawa…

A street party for Fete Nationale in Montreal on Friday, June 24, 2016…

After a group photo of parliamentarians to mark the 150th anniversary of Parliament Wednesday June 8, 2016 in Ottawa…

With employees of the STM maintenance centre in Montreal, Que., April 5, 2016…

At the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, D.C., on Friday, April 1, 2016.

With a supporter at a rally in Ottawa on October 20, 2015, hours after Liberals won the federal election…

After he delivered remarks at the Komagata Maru Apology reception in Ottawa Wednesday May 18, 2016…

With members of the public on the way to his swearing in ceremony at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on Wednesday, November 4, 2015.

With teacher Linsdsay Stuart, from Regina, at the Prime Minister’s Awards for Teaching Excellence in Ottawa on Thursday May 12, 2016.

At the Liberal Party cabinet retreat in Kananaskis, Alta., Sunday, April 24, 2016…

UP NEXT: Three Amigos Summit 2016

U.S. President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hug as the president leaves Parliament Hill on Wednesday, June 29, 2016.

U.S. President Barack Obama addresses Parliament in the House of Commons on Wednesday, June 29, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife Sophie Gregoire Trudeau share a laugh with U.S. President Barack Obama after his address

U.S. President Barack Obama is greeted by children as he arrives on Parliament Hill on Wednesday, June 29, 2016.

U.S. President Barack Obama signs the guest book during a welcome ceremony after arriving on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, as Speaker of the House of Commons Geoff Regan, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife Sophie Gregoire Trudeau and Speaker of the Senate George Furey look on, Wednesday, June 29, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and U.S. President Barack Obama take part in the closing press conference of the North American Leaders’ Summit at the National Gallery of Canada.

U.S. President Barack Obama, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Pena Neito stand in front of Parliament Hill for a group photo during the North America Leaders’ Summit at the National Gallery of Canada.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and U.S. President Barack Obama take part in the North American Leaders Summit at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa on Wednesday, June 29, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomes U.S. President Barack Obama to the North American Leaders’ Summit in Ottawa, Wednesday June 29, 2016.

U.S. President Barack Obama talks with Governor General of Canada David Johnston on the tarmac upon his arrival at Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport on Wednesday, June 29, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, his wife Sophie Gregoire Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto pose for a photograph along with Governor General David Johnston and his wife Sharon Johnston before attending a state dinner in honour of the Mexican President at Rideau Hall the official residence of the Governor General in Ottawa, Tuesday June 28, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto toast Governor General David Johnston at a state dinner in honour of the Mexican President at Rideau Hall the official residence of the Governor General in Ottawa, Tuesday June 28, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau answers a question as Mexico’s President Enrique Pena Nieto listens during a Q&A with youth at the Museum of Nature, on Tuesday, June 28, 2016 in Ottawa.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto start the day with a run across the Alexandra Bridge from Ottawa to Gatineau, Quebec on Tuesday, June 28, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau meets with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto in his office on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Tuesday, June 28, 2016.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau greets Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto at a dinner at Casa Loma in Toronto on Monday, June 27, 2016.

Mexico’s president Enrique Pena Nieto inspects during military ceremony in Quebec City Monday, June 27, 2016.

Mexico’s president Enrique Pena Nieto listens to the music during a ceremony in front of Canadian Governor General David Johnston, on Monday, June 27, 2016 in Quebec City.

Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard attend a press conference in Quebec City, Monday, June 27, 2016.

People protest against a visit by Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto in Quebec City, Monday, June 27, 2016.

Canadians Support Marijuana Bill But Believe It Won’t Prevent Youth From Accessing Pot: Poll

A new survey has found strong support for the Liberal government’s marijuana legalization plan but significant doubt in its ability to achieve the government’s key goals.

The Angus Reid Institute’s poll, released Thursday, found that 63 per cent of respondents were in favour of Bill C-45, while 37 per cent opposed it.

Left to right: National Revenue Minister Diane Lebouthiller, Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale, Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould, Health Minister Jane Philpott and Parliamentary Secretary Bill Blair hold a press conference announcing new legislation for legalizing marijuana on April 13, 2017. (Photo: Seyit Aydogan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)

The Liberals have said their legalization bill, tabled in the House of Commons last week, was crafted to strictly regulate cannabis and keep it out of the hands of young people, discourage users from driving while under the influence, and gut the pocketbooks of criminal organizations profiting off the drug.

The poll, however, found strong skepticism in the bill’s ability to do any of those things.

Sixty-six per cent of respondents, for example, said they didn’t think the bill would discourage youth from using or abusing the drug, and 55 per cent believe it won’t keep criminal organizations from the marijuana trade.

New penalties for selling pot to minors

An accompanying bill, C-46, would introduce new criminal charges to deter users from driving while impaired. The law would also install penalties for selling pot to minors that range from police citations to jail terms of up to 14 years.

The legislation, once passed, would allow police to use what Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould called “oral fluid screening devices” to check drivers for marijuana impairment.

Fifty-one per cent of the respondents in Angus Reid’s survey said they don’t think those measures will discourage driving under the influence of pot, while 49 per cent said the new punishments would do the trick.

The Liberals set a minimum age of 18 for purchasing recreational pot, but gave provincial governments the ability to set a higher age if desired.

In fact, many aspects of the government’s pot legalization plan are left to the provinces, such as how much cannabis will be taxed and where it will be sold.

The survey found dispensaries were the most popular choice across the country, with 68 per cent preferring them as a designated place to purchase pot. Sixty per cent said they preferred marijuana to be sold in government agencies like provincially-run liquor stores, and just 35 per cent said they wanted it to be ordered online and delivered by mail.

The Liberals are aiming to have the two bills passed by July 2018.

The Angus Reid Institute’s poll was conducted online among a representative randomized sample of 1,467 Canadians. The firm said in its report that a probability sample of this size would have a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.

With files from The Canadian Press

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4/20 Vancouver organizers say Liberals’ Cannabis Act maintains criminalization and the reasons to protest

With Canada now well on its way to legal recreational marijuana, what is there left for activists to protest at Vancouver’s annual 4/20 event?

Plenty, according to organizers of the massive gathering, which is scheduled to happen this Thursday (April 20) at Sunset Beach in the city’s West End.

In a telephone interview, Canada’s most prominent advocate for marijuana reform, Jodie Emery, was highly critical of legislation the Liberal government tabled in Parliament on April 13.

“It is prohibition 2.0,” she told the Georgia Straight. “It is not legalization. It is a continuation of the kind of criminalization that we’ve seen before, with the introduction of even harsher laws that will victimize even more peaceful Canadians.”

Emery said that this year’s 4/20 event is therefore about getting people involved in aspects of the legalization process that still remain to be determined.

“The provincial governments and city governments will be drafting a lot of the actual details, so we have to start reaching out to our elected officials there and telling them the truth about cannabis,” she explained.

If passed into law, the Liberal government’s Cannabis Act will make it legal for people to purchase and possess up to 30 grams of marijuana (as long as it is produced by a company authorized by the federal government). It would also permit individuals to grow up to four plants in their home.

Dana Larsen said that’s the good news. In a separate interview, the former vice president of the Canadian Association of Cannabis Dispensaries added that just about everything else in the Liberals’ plan is bad news. For example, Larsen said, the proposed laws provide for prison sentences for anyone caught giving even a small amount of weed to a friend under the age of 18. They also make it a crime to smoke a joint that was rolled with marijuana that was not grown by a company approved for production by Ottawa.

“Unless you grow it yourself or you buy it legally, even possession is still banned,” Larsen continued. “There are no comparable laws for alcohol or tobacco where they restrict the ownership of your alcohol like that.”

Larsen asked why the Liberals have proposed jail time for people who break the rules with marijuana while similar offences with alcohol or tobacco only result in fines.

“I would actually be happy if they just took all the alcohol rules and laid them on to cannabis,” he said. “I believe that the rules should be less severe for cannabis, because it is so much safer than alcohol. But as a term of public policy, I understand.”

In a separate interview, Kirk Tousaw, an Abbotsford-based lawyer who specializes in drug crimes, said that because it is widely understood that marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, these tougher penalties for weed simply don’t make sense.

“That is just out of whack with what any rational system of government regulation should want to do,” he said. “You should want to penalize offences involving the more dangerous substances more harshly, not less harshly.”

The Vancouver police estimated that more than 20,000 people met at Sunset Beach during the climax of 2016’s 4/20 festival.

In October 2015, when Justin Trudeau was still a candidate on the campaign trail, the Straight published an in-depth report on the competing Liberal and NDP plans for marijuana reform. It noted that during the first six months of that year, only 327 people spent time inside a B.C. Corrections institution for a drug crime.

However, an additional 1,069 British Columbians were convicted of a drug offence but were given probation or released on a conditional sentence. A number of people interviewed who fell into that category told the Straight stories of how their names were entered into computer systems that complicated things like international travel and job applications.

Tousaw warned that under the Liberals’ framework for legalization, people will continue being arrested for marijuana and will be stuck with records that could haunt them for decades.

“It seems very clear that the government is committed to retaining significant criminal penalties, including the prospect of lengthy prison terms for cannabis-related activities that fall outside of the fairly narrow confines of what is going to be legalized,” he said. “There is no reason that a Canadian with 31 grams of cannabis should face a criminal record and the possibly of being fined or going to jail because they are one gram over some arbitrary number.”

Larsen emphasized that as long as people are going to prison for marijuana, Vancouver’s 4/20 festival is a demonstration against laws he described as unjust.

“It remains a protest,” he said. “Anyone who thought that this was going to be a big celebration and that we have nothing left to protest anymore, they are very wrong.”

No plan for pot-conviction amnesty amid legalization move, Liberals say

The federal plan to legalize recreational marijuana does not include the general amnesty for past pot convictions some would like to see, says Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale.

Newly tabled legislation would allow people 18 and older to publicly possess up to 30 grams of dried cannabis, or its equivalent in non-dried form.

But the Trudeau government is not considering a blanket pardon for people with criminal records for possessing small amounts of the drug, Goodale said in an interview.

“That’s not an item that’s on the agenda at the moment.”

The government has also made it clear that the move to legalization by mid-2018 doesn’t mean lax law enforcement during the transition period.

“It is important to note that as the bill moves through the legislative process, existing laws prohibiting possession and use of cannabis remain in place, and they need to be respected,” Goodale told a news conference last Thursday.

“This must be an orderly transition. It is not a free-for-all.”

The federal government has introduced legislation to legalize and regulate the sale of recreational marijuana by July, 2018. (Darryl Dyck/Canadian Press)

The NDP has called on the government to immediately decriminalize simple possession, calling it a logical first step that would prevent young people from being burdened with criminal records for the rest of their lives.

Eligible for record suspension after 5 years

The C.D. Howe Institute, a prominent think-tank, has recommended the government consider pardoning people convicted of pot possession — and drop any outstanding charges — to free up much-needed resources for legalization.

Legalization could initially result in an increase in consumption and a need for more police monitoring and enforcement, prompting more government spending, the institute said last year in a policy paper.

“This discussion suggests that dropping charges against individuals for illegal possession who have no other Criminal Code convictions or charges, would save considerable government resources without other significant offsetting adverse spillovers,” it said.

“Similarly, the federal government should consider pardoning individuals who have been convicted for illegal possession but have not been convicted or charged for any other Criminal Code offence.”

A pardon doesn’t erase a criminal record. But it can make it easier for someone to find work, travel and generally contribute to society.

Goodale noted there is already a formal process to have a criminal record set aside.

Those convicted of simple possession of up to 30 grams of marijuana are eligible to apply for a pardon, now known as a record suspension, five years after their sentence is completed.

The Liberal government is reviewing Conservative changes that made people wait longer and pay more to obtain a record suspension. Goodale said “there’s no specific consideration” of difficulties in obtaining pardons for marijuana convictions.

“But the law does exist where people can make an application and have their case considered.”

An internal Public Safety Canada briefing note, released last year under the Access to Information Act, said the issue of record suspensions would be “important to consider during the marijuana legalization discussions.”