Cannabis Bill
Excerpt from Debates of the Senate (Hansard)
Thursday, June 7, 2018
Cannabis Bill
Motion in Amendment Adopted
The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Do you have a question, honourable senator?
Hon. Sandra M. Lovelace Nicholas: Yes.
The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Would you accept a question, Senator Gold?
Senator Gold: Of course.
Senator Lovelace Nicholas: Don’t you think that prescribed medical marijuana is better than prescribing opioids?
Senator Gold: Thank you for your question. The short answer is yes. I’m not a doctor so I wouldn’t presume to know all the circumstances in which it would be helpful, but from my own experience — and I suspect most of us have experience with colleagues, friends and family members — there is no question in my mind that the responsible and supervised use of certain cannabis products for certain conditions provides enormous relief and benefit to Canadians. It is certainly better than the use and overuse of prescription drugs like opiates, which, though necessary for pain relief in acute circumstances, has caused devastating negative impacts on so many thousands if not millions of users.
The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Senator Gold, would you accept another question?
Senator Gold: Yes, with pleasure.
Hon. Marty Deacon: Thank you, Senator Gold. As I listen today, I must say that the decision, contrary to what you may have expressed this afternoon, was not an easy one for me. I’m that newer independent senator who 15 weeks ago could not envision supporting the legalization of cannabis. I certainly learned, like many, very quickly the complexity, our vulnerability, the need to ask many questions —
The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Are you on debate or are you asking a question?
Senator Deacon: I’m going to ask a question. The need to do all these things. As we have gone through the past six weeks and much more information, and from our different experiences, I would like to ask you today, based on what you have said, do you believe that due diligence has been done at all levels and in every corner possible? Do you believe that the prime purpose of this bill is still to help our youth and regulate cannabis? Do you believe that, if this bill is passed, there will be an accountability and monitoring
framework to ensure that all Canadians are educated to have a deeper understanding of their actions and decisions?
Senator Gold: Thank you very much for your question. There were three or four questions. So the answer is yes, yes, yes and yes, if there was a fourth one.
With regard to due diligence, let’s leave aside the decades of work and study and reflection on this issue and just start with the task force. Let’s leave aside the task force and the work that they did. The House of Commons studied this bill extensively. Most important, we did. I don’t have the statistics at hand. We have had dozens and dozens of committee meetings, hundreds of witnesses, hours and hours of good debate — some of our finest debates. I’m more than satisfied that in the Senate we have completed a process of very rigorous, critical scrutiny and review.
Vis-à-vis your question about the prime purpose, this is a complex issue of social policy; and, therefore, it’s a complex bill so it has multiple purposes. They are set out in clause 7 of the bill. Certainly protecting youth is one of them and of great concern. Equally, as well, the bill serves the important purposes of reducing the stigma and marginalization of adults and youth who are exposed to the criminal justice system through the criminalization of cannabis as it has been. There are others, and I won’t elaborate; it will be a long day.
Vis-à-vis the accountability and monitoring framework, there is a lot to say there. I’ll be very brief. The bill itself, as amended by the Social Affairs Committee, and further amended here, provides clear review and reporting for the Senate. There is more than that. We have heard talk and the importance of perhaps getting third party independent monitoring of the legislation as it rolls out because we can characterize it differently, but there will be bumps on the road. It’s not irresponsible to acknowledge that when we pass a complicated piece of legislation. But it is responsible to put into place monitoring mechanisms so that we can quickly respond as we need to with the flexibility and the diligence that the issues and Canadians require.
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In addition to those formal mechanisms, let’s not forget the power that we have in this place. In the Senate, we have the power to ask questions, to demand written answers and to hold the government to account. We have the ability, through our committee system, to demand reports — I’m getting caught up in this; I get excited. We have a lot of tools at our disposal. We can launch inquiries. We can insist upon timely reports. We don’t have to wait five years to get information on how it’s working, and we can use — if it’s not an inappropriate term — the bully pulpit that we have as senators to bring these issues to the public’s attention. I’ve forgotten civil society. We get caught up in our little bubble on the Hill, but the world will be watching. That is, our world, the media world — some of them are probably here today — and the rest of the world.
Honourable senators, I have no doubt whatsoever that the implementation of this bill is going to be studied and reviewed. It’s going to be reviewed with critical eyes, especially by those who remain concerned, if not fearful, of the consequences of what I believe and what I hope we’ll do today if and when we pass this bill.
The answer, then, is yes. Thank you for your questions.
Hon. Leo Housakos: Would Senator Gold take a question?
Senator Gold: Of course. Have I ever refused you before?
Senator Housakos: I can’t ever recall an occasion.
You referred to all the decades of scientific work that the government has done on this particular bill. Can you refer us to any one study in the last five years that’s been done by any ministry of the federal government to gather data or science-based information about how much marijuana is flowing through the system, other than, of course, a study commissioned by the health ministry earlier this year, either in February or in March, in order to do an analysis of the waste water treatment across this country? I want to point out that was commissioned in February or March, but they haven’t even started the work yet. Has there been any other data-based study by any other relevant ministry that I missed?
Senator Gold: Thank you for your question. I do not believe I said — because I wasn’t intending to say it — that it was government studies over decades. I said that this is an issue that has been studied over the decades. It certainly was studied in the Le Dain commission and, in this place, in the Senate committee. It has been studied by academic research scientists and was contained in public policy issues over the years. If I gave the impression, Senator Housakos, that I was referring to specific federal government studies, I apologize for that.
What I meant to say was — and I think the point still stands — that this is an issue that thoughtful, experienced, serious people have been wrestling with for decades, and properly so. We didn’t come to it cold. So when the bill was introduced, it was based upon decades and decades of thoughtfulness, consideration and experience with what the current criminalization prohibition had brought and the havoc that it had wrought on our communities.