By: Torstar News Service
Former Toronto police Chief Bill Blair has been tapped to help the Liberals make good on an election pledge to reform current marijuana laws.
OTTAWA—Former Toronto police Chief Bill Blair will help lead the Liberal efforts to legalize marijuana.
Blair, who made the leap from policing to politics last year, has been tapped to help Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to make good on an election pledge to reform current marijuana laws, which the Liberals argue don’t work because too many Canadians wind up with a criminal record for possessing only small amounts of the drug.
The party’s election platform spelled out the commitment to loosen the laws. “We will remove marijuana consumption and incidental possession from the Criminal code and create new stronger laws to punish more severely those who provide it to minors, those who operate a motor vehicle while under its influence, and those who sell it outside of the new regulatory framework,” the platform said.
The Liberals promised to create a federal-provincial task force to study the issue and consult widely with experts in the fields of public health, substance abuse and law enforcement.
Even before he was elected in the riding of Scarborough Southwest in the October vote, Blair had voiced support for the Liberal position, saying the current laws had done little to keep marijuana out of the hands of young people or organized crime from profiting from its sale.
“The decision to sell marijuana to a 14-year-old is often made by a gangster behind some apartment building,” Blair told Torstar in an interview last April. “I think legalization, as long it’s coupled with regulation, is the way forward.”
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