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drugs Tag

08 Dec 2017 Could marijuana decriminalization present an opportunity for better policy?

Posted at 17:49h in Blog, Criminal Justice 0 Comments
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by John Sikkema Parliament is well on its way to legalizing marijuana. Bill C-45, the “Cannabis Act”, has passed in the House of Commons and is now in the Senate. It will likely be law early next year. Our government acknowledges marijuana is harmful, particularly for young people. So it proposes to severely punish selling to a young person, while legalizing a recreational marijuana market. But if pot becomes more pervasive and easily available than it is today – as current investment in massive marijuana grow-ops suggests it will – it isn’t...

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01 Jun 2017 “Safe Injection Sites” – Coming to a City Near You?

Posted at 09:23h in Blog, Criminal Justice 2 Comments
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By John Sikkema “Safe” or “supervised” injection sites provide drug users with clean needles and medical supervision for injecting narcotics. So far, there are none in Canada outside of Vancouver. But that is likely to change. Parliament just made it a lot easier to establish safe injection sites with Bill C-37, which passed earlier this month. Canada’s Health Minister is currently reviewing 19 applications for such sites, and more applications are expected. Another win for “harm reduction” You may recall the 2011 Insite case (Canada v PHS Community Services Society), in which the Supreme...

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03 Feb 2015 Marijuana: Personal liberty or State responsibility?

Posted at 20:30h in Criminal Justice, Justice and Freedom 0 Comments
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This past year, ARPA's legal counsel hosted a discussion about marijuana with two political thinkers, Matt Bufton of the Institute for Liberal Studies and Joseph Ben-Ami of the Arthur Meighen Institute. The discussion focused on laws pertaining to marijuana and whether they should liberalized or kept the way they are now. During the discussion, André was able to interject with questions from a Christian perspective, challenging both Matt and Joseph on their positions. Thanks to the able assistance of our IT guy, Nate Bosscher, we have captured the best parts...

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15 May 2014 Committee Work on the Hill

Posted at 15:20h in Criminal Justice, Uncategorised 0 Comments
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Special report by ARPA Canada intern Mark Luimes If you ask most Canadians what they think about parliamentary procedure, they will typically recall question period - the energetic, overly partisan war of words that is publicly televised on CPAC (Cable Public Affairs Channel). Many will come away from question period unimpressed with the seeming inability of MPs to give straight answers or engage in meaningful debate on government issues. What most people don't realize, however, is that question period provides a poor picture of the life and work of our parliamentarians. In reality, a significant part of the real work is done in small, multi-partisan committees, characterized by higher levels of co-operation, decorum, and policy analysis than what is typically displayed in question period.
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