Proceedings of the Special Committee on
Illegal Drugs
Issue 17 - Evidence
RICHMOND, Tuesday, May 14, 2002
The Special Senate Committee on Illegal Drugs met this day at 1:02 p.m. to reassess Canada's anti-drug legislation and policies.
Senator Pierre Claude Nolin (Chairman) in the Chair.
[English]
The Chairman: I would like to open this meeting of the Special Senate Committee on Illegal Drugs. Welcome to colleagues and those of you who have accepted our invitation to make a presentation to the committee.
The committee is now embarking on the second phase of work. In the past eighteen months, we have heard and read many briefs and listened to many expert witnesses. We released a discussion paper two weeks ago in Ottawa to trigger a valid and informed dialogue with Canadians. The committee will report to the senate no later than the 13 of September this year.
We are here to listen to representatives from local organizations who have something to add to the discussion paper. The discussion paper was not meant to be the final word or the final report. It was only one component that would influence definitely the final product. But the thing is, local organizations and Canadians will also be part of that report.
Our first witness this afternoon is from the B.C. Civil Liberties Association.
Mr. John McIntyre, Member of the Board, B.C. Civil Liberties Association: On behalf of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, BCCLA, I would like to thank the Senate Special Committee on Illegal Drugs for the opportunity to appear before you today.
The BCCLA is Canada's oldest and most active autonomous civil liberties organization. It has been operating as a non-profit society since 1963. It has roughly 1,100 members from diverse backgrounds.
The BCCLA has an extensive record of advocacy in defence of constitutional rights and civil liberties of British Columbians. The BCCLA participates in public education, debate on government policy and legislation, and legal advocacy.
The BCCLA has a long history of involvement in the issues of drug use and the criminal law. Specifically, its involvement in public debate in the area dates back to its 1969 submissions to the LeDain Commission of Inquiry into the Non-Medical Use of Drugs. In 1995, the BCCLA made submissions to the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs regarding Bill C-7, the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, as well as the Commons Special Committee on the Non-medical use of Drugs last December. Copies of both of those submissions, as well as our 1979 paper, ``Notes towards a BCCLA position on Cannabis Law Reform,'' are available to members of the committee. My remarks will closely follow those submitted by the Association to the Commons Special Committee last December.
Since 1969, the BCCLA's consistent position has been that the criminalization of the possession and the use of drugs is unjustifiable and should be eliminated. The basis of our opposition to the criminal prohibition of drug possession and use is essentially twofold: First, the BCCLA believes that respect for personal autonomy demands that the state not interfere with the personal choices made by individuals for the purposes of imposing a particular morality upon them; second, that the imposition of criminal law prohibitions can only be justified where the impugned conduct presents some serious risk of harm to others, or society as a whole. The evidence does not support the view that the use or possession of drugs does present the risk of such serious harm to others. Conversely, we submit that the harms associated with the criminalization of drugs far outweigh any harm that might be caused to society by the use of drugs in the first place.
The essence of a truly free and democratic society subsists in the liberty of individual citizens to make decisions for themselves about what constitutes the good life. Our courts have recognized this principle as one that underlies the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. As stated by Madam Justice Wilson in R. v. Morgentaler:
... the state will respect choices made by individuals and, to the greatest extent possible, will avoid subordinating these choices to any one conception of the good life.
We are each entitled to a sphere of privacy within which we can decide what we wish to believe and how we wish to behave. Within that private sphere, we are entitled to make choices with which others may disagree and which may even be harmful to ourselves. John Mill wrote nearly 150 years ago in, On Liberty:
... the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.
To impose criminal sanctions on drug use is to interfere, in the most profound and invasive way that the state can, with a personal decision that is, simply, none of the state's business. To use the coercive power of criminal law as a means of influencing individuals' decisions about whether to use drugs is unsupportable on the basis of respect for human dignity and autonomy.
Following upon the principle of respect for individual autonomy is the equally important principle that citizens ought to be subject to the criminal law only in circumstances where the conduct in question presents some serious risk of harm to others. Majoritarian opinions about the morality or immorality of a given act are no basis upon which to impose criminal prohibitions on such acts. While this principle finds its genesis as far back as Jeremy Bentham, a more modern expression of it may be found in the report of the 1969 Ouimet Committee on Corrections, ``Toward Unity: Criminal Justice and Corrections,'' in which the following criteria were adopted for determining the proper scope of the criminal law:
1. No act should be criminally proscribed unless its incidence, actual or potential, is substantially damaging to society.
2. No act should be criminally prohibited where its incidence may adequately be controlled by social forces other than the criminal process. Public opinion may be enough to curtail certain kinds of behaviour. Other kinds of behaviour may be appropriately dealt with by non-criminal legal processes, e.g. by legislation related to mental health or social and economic condition.
3. No law should give rise to social or personal damage greater than it was designed to prevent.
The application of these criteria to the possession and use of drugs leads inevitably to the conclusion that their criminalization cannot be supported, and that other mechanisms such as education, prevention, treatment, and harm reduction programs and regulation ought to be employed.
Turning to the first criterion, there is no persuasive evidence that drug possession or use, in and of itself, is substantially damaging to society. It is likely, in fact, that the evils sometimes commonly associated with drug use, such as criminality and other anti-social behaviour, are the result of the criminalization of drugs and the resulting criminal sub-culture. Just as in the times of prohibition of alcohol, underground industry and commerce sprung up to supply society with the illicit product that a not insignificant portion of our society desires. Just as with alcohol, it is part of growing up and a right of passage for individuals to experiment with presently illicit drugs. When they do, they are forced to walk on the wild side, to associate with illegal suppliers. They can develop disrespect for the law because the legal proscriptions are viewed as an invalid intrusion into their personal lives — their personal choices and freedoms.
In the absence of solid proof that drug use itself is causing societal harm, the imposition of criminal penalties cannot be justified. In this connection it is important to bear in mind that the vast majority of those who use drugs do so on a recreational basis and are able to manage their drug use in a manner that does not interfere with their ability to conduct their daily lives. To impose a blanket criminal law on all those who use drugs because of concerns about the harmful effects of drug use on a small minority of users is wrong as a matter of criminal law policy. If there is persuasive evidence of substantial societal harm related to particular drug-related activity, then the law should target that activity and only that activity. Thus, for example, the law can and should criminalize the act of driving a motor vehicle while impaired by drug use, just as it does for another common and more socially acceptable drug: alcohol.
The second criterion has a clear role to play in any discussion of the appropriate societal response to drug use. Society can and should institute programs designed to educate the public about drug use, treatment and rehabilitation programs for those individuals who wish to participate in them, and harm reduction programs to mitigate the potential personally harmful effects of some forms of drug use, including for example, needle exchange programs and safe injection sites. Mention must also be made in this connection of social programs designed to target the underlying social and economic causes of drug abuse.
Finally, the third criterion also has special relevance to the question of the criminalization of drug use. This committee is already familiar with some of the deleterious effects of the criminalization of drug possession and use. These include: The imposition of criminal records that can haunt a person in many areas of life, including obtaining employment and travel abroad; the creation of a criminal drug sub-culture in which users are forced to associate with criminals in order to obtain their drug of choice; the maintenance of a lucrative criminal drug distribution industry with all of its attendant vices; the creation of a marginalized class of persons who may have difficulty accessing necessary health care and other public services; vast expenditures of financial, structural, and human resources in the so-called ``war on drugs,'' resources which could be better utilized to deal with the underlying social and economic causes of drug abuse and to assist those addicts who wish treatment; the authorization of extensive police intrusion into the private lives of citizens to investigate and prosecute drug offences; increased health risks to users due to the lack of any governmental quality control or monitoring of illegal drugs; the inability of the taxation system to tax the revenues of trading in drugs; the risk of arbitrary, capricious, or discriminatory application and enforcement of the law; and, where discretion is employed not to prosecute drug offences, a contribution to a general lack of respect for the law and those charged with enforcing it.
In addition to the foregoing, recognition should be taken of the further economic impact that criminalization of the possession and use of drugs has on all of society. What are the costs to society of paying for a single person diagnosed with HIV/AIDS due to unsafe drug consumption practices? What are the costs to society for personal property insurance as a result of the commission of petty crimes to feed habits? What are the costs to society, particularly our urban populations, as a result of the hidden ``grow-ops'' that are constructed and maintained in houses, often rental houses? Would we all not be safer and economically better off without the criminalization of drugs?
The personal and societal costs of the continued criminalization of drug use and possession far outweigh any hypothetical benefit to be derived therefrom. The criminal prohibition on drug use is not working. It has never worked. It is long past time to try another approach.
In conclusion, the BCCLA is heartened to see the growing appreciation among politicians of all stripes and at all levels, as well as within the population at large, that the traditional prohibition model of dealing with drug use is not working. This committee is to be congratulated on its willingness to examine all of the underlying issues relating to the non-medical use of drugs in Canada, and to look at innovative policies to address those issues.
To see how ineffectual the criminalization of the use of drugs is, one need look no further than the recent testimony of Inspector Kash Heed, Commanding Officer of the Vancouver Police Department's Vice and Drug Section, made before this committee last year, in which he testified that the department urged the removal of criminal sanctions for marijuana use in particular.
On a daily basis, we see stories in the media about the need for safe injection sites or the inadequate resources being devoted to the prevention of drug abuse and treatment for addicts. These are important issues and they need to be addressed. It is the BCCLA's sincere hope that this committee will take advantage of the present opportunity to make recommendations for principled and systematic reform of our nation's drug laws, reform which will see the removal of all criminal sanctions for drug use and possession as part of a larger strategy to deal with the issues raised by the use of drugs in our society. A good start is with the decriminalization of the use of marijuana. Society would be better served treating this substance in the same manner as it regulates alcohol and tobacco.
Senator Kenny: Thank you, Mr. McIntyre, for a very interesting presentation. If I understand the case that you are putting forward, you are not differentiating between any drugs. The whole basket of drugs applies to this brief?
Mr. McIntyre: The whole basket of drugs applies. However, for marijuana in particular, there is even less of an argument in favour of any further criminalization of the product.
Senator Kenny: Of any further criminalization?
Mr. McIntyre: Well, the continued criminalization of the product.
Senator Kenny: Could you define for the committee what you mean by ``substantial societal harm''?
Mr. McIntyre: To which section are you referring?
Senator Kenny: The harm principle.
Mr. McIntyre: I do not believe that I can establish for this committee what the BCCLA's view is of ``substantial societal harm.'' Obviously, it is a weighing of the consequences of the conduct in terms of how it affects society. In the BCCLA's view, the criminalization of drugs in general has created an atmosphere that permits criminal elements to step into a void and profit at all of our expense in supplying an illicit product. The prohibition of the use of drugs is never going to be stamped out, no matter how draconian the law. There is always going to be a portion of our society that will exercise their personal choices to experiment, if nothing else, with respect to these products.
Senator Kenny: If I understood your argument correctly, you are saying that government has a right to intrude on the individual only if government can demonstrate that there will be substantial societal harm.
Mr. McIntyre: Correct.
Senator Kenny: I was trying to understand what is that threshold in the view of your organization.
Mr. McIntyre: Well, in the mind of our organization obviously the threshold is not met because of our longstanding position with respect to the use of drugs. We see it as a personal choice.
Senator Kenny: What is that threshold?
Mr. McIntyre: I cannot establish that, other than our own perspective what we say the threshold is. We say the societal harm is not met by the use of drugs, any drugs.
Senator Kenny: If you do not have that definition, I will leave it, but you should know it is a question in my mind.
Mr. McIntyre: I understand.
Senator Kenny: You used the phrase ``is none of the State's business'' in your comments about imposing criminal sanctions on drug use. At what age does the expression, ``none of the State's business'' apply? Are you talking about people over the age of majority, people over the age of 15, or does it apply down to a six-year-old?
Mr. McIntyre: I do not believe this is any different from alcohol or tobacco in terms of levels at which society says choices can be made. I believe it may have been in the paper that was released by the special committee where there is an indication that up to 50 per cent of high school students experiment with the use of marijuana during the course of high school.
Senator Kenny: For your presentation what age are you saying?
Mr. McIntyre: We are not establishing an age. We are saying that it is appropriate for the government to establish an age that will be similar to alcohol, probably tobacco, but with a realistic expectation that the kids are going to try it.
Senator Kenny: In this province is it 19?
Mr. McIntyre: Nineteen.
Senator Kenny: For both tobacco and alcohol?
Mr. McIntyre: Actually when it comes to tobacco I cannot really comment because I am not a user. I ignore the warnings when they sell tobacco as to what age you have to be to purchase it. The age for alcohol is 19.
Senator Kenny: What are the obligations of the state to educate and protect?
Mr. McIntyre: The obligations of the state in that regard I would say are similar to education with respect to the harms associated with tobacco use. Because marijuana has not been studied as extensively as tobacco has, it is not yet known as to what kind of long-term effects may be associated with its use. However, my understanding from some of the materials on marijuana use is that people who consume marijuana tend to consume to get high and they stop. It is not like tobacco use where people chain smoke one after another because of the need to feed the addiction. It does not work in the same manner or the same method. So I guess I may have fallen off track in terms of your question.
Senator Kenny: What are the obligations of the state to educate and protect is the question.
Mr. McIntyre: The obligations of the state are to, as with any other drug, and I include in that alcohol and nicotine, obligations to educate on the harmful effects. It is more of a health concern.
Senator Kenny: Is the state the appropriate agent for this?
Mr. McIntyre: A level of the state. Just as we are now dealing with individuals who are victims of their own drug use, there are NGOs and other organizations that, sometimes with assistance from government specialize in trying to help people get off their drug addiction.
Senator Kenny: What I am driving at it shows with tobacco, that authority figures like province or the federal government tend not to be seen as good people to communicate that to adolescents.
Mr. McIntyre: Nor parents to some extent. The state cannot take the place of the parents when it comes to raising the children.
Senator Kenny: So who has the obligation then to educate people?
Mr. McIntyre: Well, it is just part of general society education or part of the curriculum. If I were to assign responsibility between the federal government powers and provincial powers, I would say it comes through the schools.
Senator Kenny: So schools would be a good place to have education about drugs?
Mr. McIntyre: Yes.
Senator Kenny: That would be as successful as educating kids about cigarettes?
Mr. McIntyre: It would be anticipated to have the same degree of success.
Senator Kenny: It is reminiscent of an experiment that took place in North Dakota, I believe, where 22 school districts had education programs in schools about cigarettes, and 22 did not.
Mr. McIntyre: Same results?
Senator Kenny: No. The results went up where the programs were available and did not where they did not in those districts that did not have the programs.
Is it your view that government has a responsibility to ensure the quality control of drugs?
Mr. McIntyre: There is a role for government in there if the government wants to step in there. Just as it is a role of government to make sure that non-adulterated products that could potentially harm the citizenry are prevented from being poisoned.
Senator Kenny: So in the scheme that you are supporting in this brief you would have the government establish measurements or qualities for drugs before they could be put on sale?
Mr. McIntyre: I would anticipate that that would be an area in which the government could validly pass laws, just as it does with alcohol.
Senator Carney: I am interested in the medicinal use of marijuana. In your research on this subject, do you have any information on how extensive it is in British Columbia and how hard it is to get it? Can you tell us? We have in Health Canada a decision has been made to permit marijuana for medical use. We have not a very effective policy. But as you know, the government has announced it has trashed, the first crop failed, the one in the underground mine.
Mr. McIntyre: I am familiar with that.
Senator Carney: You probably know I have been promoting British Columbia as the source of all things perfect, including medicinal marijuana. But do you have experience, or can you tell us whether it is widely used here for medical purposes or if it is hard to get? Just what is the effect of this policy in implementation? Now, as I say, there is the Vancouver Island Compassion Society and other people here, but I just would be interested in your experience.
Mr. McIntyre: I cannot tell you. I have no information to pass on in that area.
Senator Carney: I hope that we have other witnesses who can.
The Chairman: On page 3 of your brief, you talk about criminal records. We have been told by various police organizations that since Bill C-8 in 1996, if you are only charged and found guilty of simple possession of small quantity, you do not have a criminal record. What do you have to say to that?
Mr. McIntyre: I am a criminal lawyer in part. I prosecute. I defend. I have done it for both provincial offences as well as federal offences. I have been practicing for more than 20 years. My familiarity with respect to that is that if it is a summary conviction offence, the police do not have the right to take fingerprints. But if it is a hybrid offence — which could be prosecuted either summarily or by indictment — the police do have that right. Commonly, they take fingerprints first and ask questions later. Once your fingerprints are taken, your name is entered onto the police computer, the CPIC system. That CPIC system can be accessed by American authorities, especially border agencies, when you are trying to cross the border. You may not have a criminal record, but there is a record.
The Chairman: There is a trace.
Mr. McIntyre: There is a trace of you having been associated with the use of marijuana, which could lead to further inquiries, either at the border, or further searches at the border, or even being turned around at the border when you are trying to cross into the United States.
The Chairman: You are saying that regardless of the level of quantity or the type of prosecution process, there will be a trace. Hence, someone probably not even found guilty can have his name or a trace of his identity in the system. The system goes across the border.
Mr. McIntyre: As the system is set up, that is the way it works.
The Chairman: You already answered on the regulation question, so we will question other witnesses on that.
On the last page of your brief you talk about decriminalization of use of marijuana, and you follow up by the sentence, ``Society would be better served treating this substance in the same manner as it regulates alcohol and tobacco.'' What is your definition of ``decriminalization''?
Mr. McIntyre: My definition would be that it is removed completely from any Controlled Substance Act, that you allow the marketplace to provide sources that can be regulated through the government — probably the provincial government — in terms of where and how it is sold and how it is sold, just as it is with alcohol and tobacco.
The Chairman: I presume you read our brief, our discussion paper. We have a chart in the discussion paper, and we have adopted a definition for each policy. We have clearly defined two criminalization possibilities: de facto decriminalization, similar to that in the Netherlands, and de jure decriminalization, where there is a specific legislation on the fact that it is no longer criminal, but it is still an offence.
We have also a definition of legalization — which probably refers more to what you are saying — where there would be governmental control over the substance, over the distribution and the production of the substance.
It appears that your use of the term ``decriminalization'' in your brief relates more to our use of the term ``legalization'' in our discussion paper. The word ``decriminalization'' is all over the country and many people do not really know what they are talking about. That is we introduced that little chard in the discussion paper, to make sure that people would have in front of them some kind of a guide of where they want to put their vote.
Mr. McIntyre: The position set out in the paper would fall within your definition.
The Chairman: Of legalization?
Mr. McIntyre: Of legalization.
The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. McIntyre.
We will now hear from Mr. Jim Kelly, Director of the Richmond Alcohol and Drug Addiction Team, or RADAT.
Mr. Jim Kelly, Director, Richmond Alcohol and Drug Action Team (RADAT): Honourable senators, the Richmond Alcohol and Drug Action Team, RADAT, was established in 1975 as a non-profit organization. We provide substance abuse counselling and gambling counselling to adults and teens. We are funded mainly through the government. We receive some additional funding from the City of Richmond and also through our own fundraising activities.
Our program has expanded in the last few years to include withdrawal management, which is a home detox program. We do youth outreach. We have a school-based prevention worker in one of our local high schools. We have just recently acquired a prevention coordinator with money that we received from the City of Richmond. She will work with youth in schools, both the high schools and the elementary schools.
We have an eight-week education series. We do individual or group and help people that have been addicted to work on their recovery. We deal with substances such as alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and barbiturates. We are doing a lot with our withdrawal management program right now with clients who are withdrawing from barbiturates and marijuana as well. We have found that marijuana stays in the system for a long time. It can affect people for a longer period of time even than alcohol or tobacco. That is the medical fact that we know, and statistically that is there. Our referrals come through individuals, families, employers, doctors, probation officers, and from other government agencies, especially the Ministry for Children and Families in B.C.
We refer our clients to support recovery homes and to residential treatment facilities as part of their treatment. Usually when they are in support recovery, they are still attending our series and doing one-on-one counselling. Upon completion of residential treatment, they usually follow-up with us. We are an advocate for 12-Step Program and believe in that movement as well for helping people as far as a fellowship is concerned for support and recovery.
I think I will leave it at that.
The Chairman: Have you read our discussion paper?
Mr. Kelly: Briefly, yes.
Senator Carney: Are you part of the Vancouver Richmond Health Board?
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
Senator Carney: So you are part of that same health authority.
Mr. Kelly: The Vancouver Coastal Health Authority.
Senator Carney: They changed their name.
Mr. Kelly: The Richmond Health Services is an adjunct to the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority.
Senator Carney: There are some issues that are in the discussion paper that the committee has asked across the country. When you say that in your experience marijuana stays in the system longer than alcohol or tobacco, what is the effect of that?
Mr. Kelly: It stays in the fatty tissues in the body, so that when the person, even though they are not using it, if they start doing physical exercise or become anxious, that can cause the substance to release into their system, they are going to have the same effect as if they were using again. In fact, some people still believe that they are getting an effect from that, and question if they have not used, why are they still feeling that way.
Senator Carney: Can you tell me how long that is?
Mr. Kelly: Can stay up to three to six months in the system for that after.
Senator Carney: After how much use?
Mr. Kelly: That is after a substantial use of a few years.
The Chairman: When you say substantial, we want to be more precise than that. Thirty grams per month was our baseline; less than that constituted ``more than average use,'' more than that constituted ``chronic use.''
Mr. Kelly: I guess it depends again on the individual and how it affects your system, but at the same time, it is still going to stay in your system. We see people who would be chronic users and used three or four joints a day for years, 10, 15 years, that is a chronic use that is going to stay in their system.
The Chairman: That is why we have adopted the weight measure instead of the number of joints.
Senator Carney: But it is important that we get your views on this because you are working with alcohol and drugs. You are working across the board.
Mr. Kelly: Right.
Senator Carney: You are in a position to give us some anecdotal information or your views from your own work: the comparison between an addiction to drugs, or an addiction to alcohol and the effects on the body, or productivity, or society, or whatever.
Are you suggesting that if it stays in the system longer, it has a more negative effect than alcohol, or tobacco? Or are you stating it is a physiological aspect?
Mr. Kelly: It is more the physiological.
Senator Carney: It is more the physiological aspect.
Mr. Kelly: You have to look how a person is using. I do not think there are any statistics out yet around somebody that has been using marijuana and has been in a car accident. There is no test other than asking somebody to give a sample that there is marijuana in his or her system. Whereas right now with alcohol, the Breathalyzer provides an immediate response. That is another issue that can be hanging on. There is no guarantee as to what is going to happen with the car accident and traffic accidents in this regard.
Senator Carney: Do you think that would be useful information, if there would be a way of testing that?
Mr. Kelly: Yes, I do. I think it would be helpful for governments, for the insurance companies, et cetera, to determine whether or not marijuana has been a substance abuse in a traffic accident. Again, there is a health cost involved there as well, and a recovery cost, this type of thing.
Senator Carney: In your experience, is there evidence that marijuana is a gateway drug that leads to the use of hard drugs? We have heard conflicting testimony on this.
Mr. Kelly: No. I think any substance can be a gateway drug. We find that with our youth. You will have kids who start with smoking and then they may lead to marijuana. That can happen with an adult as well. A person may be experimenting in that regard to use substances, see what it is like on their system. As adolescents, most people have tried different substances as a part of growing up and seeing what the effects are. Some people are unaffected and they stop using. For others, it can graduate them to using other substances. I think any substance is a gateway substance. I do not think you can just label one as a gateway substance.
The Chairman: Once again, we have to be precise. We have read a lot of material on that, because that is one of the biggest questions Canadians are asking us to answer, and you are answering that question. When you say, ``any substance is a gateway,'' you will have to define that for us, be much more explicit.
The scientific literature that we have read and the experts we have questioned, have all concluded that the hypothesis of the gateway from cannabis to other substance does not exist. Now you are telling us that it exists from any level of quantity or subject because it affects a small quantity of users, it means that it is a generator of the gateway, or it is a trigger to use something more.
You will have to give us scientific expertise to explain why you are telling us that, otherwise we will have to disregard that part of your testimony because it does not at all outweigh the information we already have. We are accepting your experience on that. But you have to understand we have the science against you on that one.
Mr. Kelly: Not having read all the research that you have on this subject, if they are considering marijuana as the only gateway drug, I think that there are other substances that can lead to harder drugs. Tobacco can lead to marijuana use. Alcohol can lead to other substances. We have clients who are what we call ``poly-users'' so that they have alcohol and other drugs. One triggers the other, therefore that could be considered a gateway drug in that sense. So be it alcohol, cocaine, marijuana, heroin.
The Chairman: When you talk about one substance triggering another, have you looked into the cause of using substances?
Mr. Kelly: The cause?
The Chairman: Yes, what is the reason why they start using?
Mr. Kelly: I'm sorry?
The Chairman: What is the reason why they start using as opposed to one substance triggering the use of another one?
The Chairman: We had a long debate yesterday on cause and consequence.
Mr. Kelly: I can offer anecdotal information. The cause of using might lead back to family of origin issues. It can relate to having been sexually abused; they use the substance as a way of killing the pain. In other cases, they start using one substance and move on to another. For example, the starting of alcohol might make them use and want to go to another substance, be it marijuana or cocaine usually.
I think that with any substance, there are psychological reasons and physiological reasons as to why people use. The physiological effects can be a cause. There is the physical; the body wants the substance is the constant thing for people. In recovery, the individual is usually trying to deal with how his or her body is reacting when it is not getting the substance it wants.
Senator Carney: We are in the same ballpark here. I have a few questions I want to ask here, and two of them are related. Then I want to ask you about the medicinal use, because you work with doctors and nurses here.
When you are counselling people, do you differentiate between marijuana users and hard drug users?
Mr. Kelly: No.
Senator Carney: You do not?
Mr. Kelly: Anyone who comes into our office — whatever his or her substance of choice is — is looking for help. We do not differentiate that ``we do not see you because...'' So no, they are welcome to deal with anything in that regard.
Senator Carney: You do not have different approaches for hard drug users and marijuana users?
Mr. Kelly: No.
Senator Carney: The second question: Why do marijuana users come to you for counselling? Why do your clients show up in your offices? What motivates them?
Mr. Kelly: Can I ask why you are differentiating marijuana rather than any other substance too? I guess because people come to us for help regarding their substance of choice — it could be on one substance or many substances — is because they are recognizing that they need to make a change in their life. There may be behavioural problems going on. A lot of things are usually attributed to troubles at work, trouble with the law, family relation issues. We also know if people come because they are trying to do it for someone else, the program is usually not successful. They must make the move to work on issues for themselves
Senator Carney: Your question is fair, but I suppose I am asking it in the context of in your work do you see something called an addictive personality? If you are dealing with people who are alcohol or drug users, do you treat them as addictive personalities? Or do you think there is such a thing as an addictive personality from your work? If they did not use drugs, they would be using alcohol. If they did not use alcohol, they would be using drugs.
Mr. Kelly: Yes, there is a tendency for people to have an addictive personality. Again, there is a gene in the brain that does trigger that type of thing. It can happen that way.
Senator Carney: My last question relates to your work in the health system with doctors. What place does medical use of marijuana have in the system as you know it? Is it hard to access it here in British Columbia? Is it regularly dispensed?
Mr. Kelly: In all honesty, Senator Carney, we have never come across a client that is using it for medicinal purposes. I cannot answer that honestly in that regard. Whether or not it is easy for them to access, they would have to be getting a prescription from their physician.
Senator Carney: They are not your clients?
Mr. Kelly: No.
The Chairman: I want to go back to the elimination of the effect. You mentioned that six months was the time to eliminate the possible effect on physiological effect after the use of marijuana. On that subject, too we have a lot of information.
What is the substance that is released from the body of your client after six months? Is that the THC the active ingredient, or another substance?
Mr. Kelly: It is the THC. To my knowledge, it is the THC because it stays in the fatty tissues.
The Chairman: You have noted that you have clients who have had those effects after a period of six months.
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
The Chairman: Is that rare? Did that happen only once or it happens regularly?
Mr. Kelly: We have had that comment from clients at various times. It depends again on the client.
The Chairman: What are those effects.
Mr. Kelly: The effect is again they are feeling like they have been using when they have not been using. They are getting that euphoria and they are getting that effect in their body as to having used when they have not. It is usually physical activity that releases it back into their system.
The Chairman: When you first heard that, were you puzzled by that information? Have you researched that bit to understand that information? Or for you was it normal what you have been told by your clients?
Mr. Kelly: Well, it is normal in the sense of we have heard that from other medical people as well, and it has not just been the client. We have taken that as information that seems to be fairly accurate.
The Chairman: Research is telling us that for heavy users, the longest period of expulsion of the substance is a month, 27 days to be precise. Yet, inactive ingredients such as the metabolites that are also part of the substance can remain in the body, but will come out on a longer period.
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
The Chairman: That is why I am asking you those questions. You have questioned question experts on the reality of having your clients having, after six months of abstinence or stop using the substance, release of effects?
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
The Chairman: Have you questioned experts on that, or doctors?
Mr. Kelly: We have questioned doctors on it, but not necessarily experts though. We have questioned doctors on it in the medical field.
The Chairman: We are going to send you some of the information we have. I think it is important that whoever is involved in the information process delivering information to the general public, should be properly informed. If you accept, we will ask the director of research to give you that information.
Mr. Kelly: Sure.
Senator Carney: Your work is in counselling, is it?
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
Senator Carney: You are funded by the Ministry of Health. Do you have a personal view on the use of marijuana from your own perspective? Normally, counsellors do not take negative or positive views. I mean they counsel the situation that they meet. They counsel the situation that they are faced with.
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
Senator Carney: But on the basis of your work, do you have views on the use of marijuana, particularly among young people?
Mr. Kelly: Certainly I have some views on it. I mean, I consider it a drug that can do harm to the body and can lead to other substances. That is why I believe would be better to have people not using, of course.
Senator Carney: At the end of the day, do you think it is better for people not to use it? That is what I wonder.
Mr. Kelly: Yes.
Senator Carney: Do we have a curriculum vitae on your background? I would be interested in your qualifications.
Mr. Kelly: No, you do not have my c.v.
Senator Carney: Could you send us one?
Mr. Kelly: I could get it for you.
Senator Carney: Thank you.
The Chairman: Thank you very much. We will send you that information, and maybe we will send written questions.
Mr. Kelly: I will get back to you.
The Chairman: Honourable senators, our next witness is from the Vancouver Island Compassion Society, Mr. Philippe Lucas.
Mr. Philippe Lucas, Director, Vancouver Island Compassion Society: Thank you very much for this opportunity. I would like to thank everyone who is participating in this process. I hope it will have some significant results in the end.
Honourable senators, I am a teacher, a childcare worker, and the founder and director of the Vancouver Island Compassion Society, VICS. The VICS is a non-profit medicinal cannabis organization currently helping 235 critically ill Canadians gain access to a safe supply of medicine. We are also involved in a number of other projects, including a research survey protocol with Dr. Mark Ware from McGill University, a Canadian polling initiative with the Canadian Foundation for Drug Policy, and our efforts were the focus of a recent documentary called ``Crimes of Compassion,'' which was broadcast nationally a few months ago. This hard work has unfortunately led to my arrest for trafficking in marijuana. Ironically, I am also one of about a thousand Canadians who currently have legal permission to use cannabis for medical purposes, as I suffer from Hepatitis C as a result of a blood transfusion in 1982.
Let me begin by thanking the Senate special committee for its hard work. It has been interesting for many of us to watch you become more educated and informed on this subject. It was also gratifying to see your hard work produce such an even-handed and science-based discussion paper.
Medical cannabis activists are occasionally accused of being Trojan Horses for the full-scale legalization of marijuana. As a result, when I founded the VICS almost three years ago, it became important for me to separate the issue of legalization, which is a personal freedom issue in which I honestly believe, and that of medicinal use, which to me is more about immediate access and necessity. Medicinal cannabis activists were justly excited, if somewhat cautious, when Health Canada started down the long and winding road towards the distribution of medicinal marijuana. Some activists like myself and Hilary Black of the BCCCS — which I understand the committee visited on its last swing through British Columbia — actually contacted Health Canada to offer our advice and ample experience in cannabis therapeutics. We were generally well received. We met privately with then Health Minister Rock to discuss issues such as strain selection, distribution, and growing techniques.
It is thus with a great sadness that I report that after three years and countless millions spent, Health Canada has yet to supply a single gram, or even a single seed, to any sick Canadian. Although we continue to help the members of our compassion society attempt to become legal medicinal users by guiding them through the onerous application process developed by Health Canada, all of this hard work appears to be in vain. The Canadian Medical Association seems intent on sabotaging the current application process. Last week Health Minister McLellan announced that distribution of Prairie Plant Systems' famed marijuana crop has been delayed indefinitely.
Honourable senators, there is no bigger misnomer in Canadian government today than that of the Marijuana Medical Access Program. On this issue, Health Minister McLellan has said, and I would like to quote her, ``No one is more concerned than I am in relation to this situation, but trial and error is going to be part of it, and I think that people have to be patient.''
Well, I would venture to say that I am more concerned about this than Minister McLellan, because I am a medical user. Recently a young a woman in her late twenties arrived at the VICS after having undergone major surgeries and extensive chemotherapy for cancer. She had a note from her doctor giving her but a few weeks to live. Does the Minister of Health actually suggest that she should be patient while Health Canada continues to forestall its obligation? Honourable Senators, our patience has been justly exhausted with this insulting, ineffective, and uncompassionate process. Quite simply, Minister McLellan's excuses do not address the relevant facts of this matter. She states that we must develop a standardized supply in order to facilitate research. I agree with her on this count. Yet for those who need medicinal cannabis today, and there are so many suffering Canadians who do, safety should be the only concern; compassion the only consideration.
Minister McLellan states that those with exemptions can simply grow their own until the government supply is ready for distribution. If this is such a simple task, why is it that the Prairie Plant Systems, with the most high tech facilities, the advice of countless experts, and access to nearly unlimited funds, has failed to provide a useful product?
Is it not time that Health Canada began to address its court-ordered mandate, and stop forcing Canadians to risk their safety and their freedom in order to better their health?
This situation is truly unacceptable, and therefore I urge the senate to recommend a comprehensive decriminalization or legalization of cannabis. This would instantly create a climate in which research could be conducted, unfettered by unnecessary bureaucracy, while at the same time enabling those in desperate need — the sick, the suffering, and the elderly — to gain access to an immediate supply of medicinal cannabis without fear of arrest.
In question 7 of your discussion paper, you ask whether Canada should take into consideration American reactions to our drug policy. Frankly, the U.S. drug policy should not be an example or an influence on any country in the world. They have the dubious honour of concurrently suffering both the highest incarceration rates and the highest drug use rates in the world. In fact, after witnessing the DEA bust four compassion societies, which are legally sanctioned under California State Law, Berkeley City Council felt compelled to unanimously pass a resolution directing its own city police not to cooperate with the DEA in its ongoing investigation of medicinal marijuana compassion clubs. In this building right now, there are Americans who have been forced to flee their country and leave their homes, with the hope of finding peace, justice, and compassion in Canada. These brave men, women, and children are refugees of an American civil war — a war between state rights, and federal powers; a war between the futility and fear of prohibition, and the common sense and tolerance of compassion. Is this really the system that we want to continue to emulate?
I am sad to report that we are not far off our American neighbours when it comes to our current drug policy under which legitimate medicinal users and suppliers are repeatedly harassed by the police. A few weeks ago, after recent busts at both of Victoria's medical marijuana organizations, the Victoria City Council felt the need to pass a unanimous resolution in support of liberalizing our current medical marijuana laws in order to end the prosecution of the sick. Honourable Senators, why would we want to continue this obviously ineffective U.S.-style prohibition? Do we really want to keep filling our prisons with non-violent offenders? Do we actually seek to criminalize and incarcerate our own citizens for doing something about as harmful and addictive as drinking a cup of tea?
Honourable Senators, is this truly our vision for the future of Canada?
We might well ask if Canada has any other alternatives. Why must we remain so myopic in this matter? Perhaps instead of always looking south for answers, we should instead look across the Atlantic.
About a year ago, the British government was in much the same position as Canada presently finds itself. They too had called for research into marijuana use and criminalization, asked for suggestions from their panels of experts and from the general populace. Over the last few months, at the recommendation of their major medical and research organizations, England has chosen to completely revamp its drug strategy. The U.K. will now replace the obvious ineffectiveness of total interdiction, with policies based on the principle of harm reduction. In fact, by the start of this summer, the U.K. will have reclassified cannabis as a Class-C drug, making the possession and use by adults a non- arrestable offence. Should we assume that the British government is simply being irrational or impulsive? Have they seen different studies than us? No, of course not. They are not acting alone.
The always-cautious Swiss are about to legalize personal possession, production and retail distribution of marijuana. Is the Swiss government suffering from a drug-induced delirium? Of course not.
These two nations, as well as Spain, Portugal, Luxembourg, and Holland, have all demonstrated the political courage to listen to the advice of their experts and their citizenry. Most importantly, they have shown the courage to implement significant, meaningful reform. Honourable senators, for the sake of all Canadians, you must ask the federal government to do the same.
In question 8 of your discussion paper you ask what role the senate can play in this debate. I believe that the Senate can play a major role by using and spreading the knowledge that you have gleaned through this process. You can, and must, lobby the Justice Department to ensure that not one more Canadian spends a night in jail as a result of unscientific, unjustifiable laws. You can, and must, lobby Health Canada to ensure that a safe supply of cannabis is made available immediately, and that the current system is reformed to actually help, rather than hinder, access to this benign medicine.
In other words, you can ensure that no seriously ill Canadian ever has to choose between health and freedom again, because, Honourable Senators, that is no choice at all. Canadians are modern, educated, and compassionate people, and we deserve laws that reflect logic and reason rather than simple fear and prejudice.
Does the senate have the power to end this flawed and failed social policy? I certainly hope so, because it is obvious that the current government has shown little motivation or conviction regarding these important matters. Health Canada has repeatedly ignored its court-ordered obligations. The Canadian Medical Association has turned a blind, unsympathetic eye to the suffering of Canadians, and a deaf ear to science and the experiences of its own doctors. Honourable senators, we have to stop legislating morality. We have to stop persecuting personal choice.
Will you have the conviction to end this unscientific war on responsible adult cannabis users? Will you have the common sense to offer our children information, understanding and compassion, rather than prosecution and incarceration? Will you have the strength to speak out for the sickest and weakest Canadians?
In August, you will release a report based on what has been learned in this long investigative process, and we hope you will make recommendations based on principles of harm reduction and principles of tolerance.
I ask, Honourable Senators, that you not allow these recommendations to go unheeded. I ask that this final report not become the next LeDain Commission, to be looked upon wistfully 30 years from now while Canadians continue to suffer. I ask humbly and simply that you have the courage to end this war on personal rights and on freedoms. I ask you, honourable senators, to have the courage to declare a drug peace.
Senator Carney: Mr. Lucas, you were charged earlier this year with distributing marijuana; is that correct?
Mr. Lucas: Possession for the purpose of, yes.
Senator Carney: This story in the Victoria Times says that there will be a sentencing decision at a later date. I would like to know what happened. What happened to this court case?
Mr. Lucas: We had a day and a half sentencing hearing. Judge Higginbotham at the time seemed to be very responsive to the information he was receiving. He has asked for some extra time to actually write a written decision, hopefully to set a precedent, and we will find out on July 5. That is when we are scheduled to come in to hear his final result of that.
Senator Carney: So you do not know yet?
Mr. Lucas: We do not know yet.
Senator Carney: The jury is out.
Mr. Lucas: The jury is out, per se.
The Chairman: Maybe we should not be comment on that. If you want the judge to use his full extent of his authority, I think we should let the court do that.
Mr. Lucas: Senator Carney, these charges are very serious to me. I am a childcare worker and a teacher, and if these charges stick, I will never be able do these.
Senator Carney: We know that, as you say, this has not been disposed of.
I wanted to ask you about your experience with Health Canada policy. I understand this is a policy put in place by Health Canada, and the issue here now is to find out whether it is effective. The indication if it is not. The next question is: How can it be made more effective? Once the government agency decides to go down this route, what are they doing wrong, and what should happen to make it more effective?
Mr. Lucas: I cannot think of a single reason why someone in Ottawa should be standing between a patient and his or her doctor. I think that if the doctor's recommendation is for cannabis, that should certainly be enough to allow somebody who needs it, to use it. Right now, as someone who is suffering from hepatitis C, I need a recommendation of not only one doctor, but also two specialists in order to get my government recognized right to use medical marijuana.
Senator Carney: What kind of specialists?
Mr. Lucas: I am scheduled to see a specialist and gastroenterologist. It takes eight months to get an appointment with a specialist. To see two presumably within 16 months, the system is far too onerous, and is far too arbitrary itself.
We have 235 members in the Vancouver Island Compassion Society. Of those, 15 have legal permission to use it. These people are by no means the sickest or the brightest, they just happen to be lucky enough to have doctors who support it, and who have patiently gone through the system.
Senator Carney: Can you tell me more about what you need to get a legal permission to use it and what does use mean? Is it limited to growing it or what? Explain the policy.
Mr. Lucas: I have to get a doctor's permission, and then I have to get two specialists. That is someone with hepatitis C, as I am sure you all know, is becoming quite the scourge in Canada.
Senator Carney: Is it different for different diseases?
Mr. Lucas: Yes, absolutely. There are three different categories: The first category is terminal illness, and it takes just one doctor's recommendation to get it for that. ``Terminal'' is defined as death within 12 months. If you should — heaven forbid — outlive your terminal diagnosis, you then become category two, at which point you need a doctor and a specialist. That would be conditions like AIDS, epilepsy, and severe arthritis. In category three, we have got hepatitis C, pain due to injury and all that. For that you need a doctor and two specialists.
It is quite clear that a lot of the people who got their exemption under the original system — the section 66 exemption, which by the way, was much easier —are not able to get it under the new system. I have my old exemption, and I am finding it very difficult to get it under the new system.
Senator Carney: You have this piece of paper from your doctor.
Mr. Lucas: The paper is issued by Health Canada.
Senator Carney: From Health Canada? No, you have a recommendation from your doctor. Then what do you do? You waited months to see him. You get the piece of paper. Then what do you do?
Mr. Lucas: I send it in to Health Canada and it goes through an evaluation process to see if everything has been done as it should have been. As I said, in my case it is a doctor and two specialists. The evaluation process takes three to six months in our experience. At that point they will contact you either for your exemption or will tell you that you have been rejected, or whatnot.
Senator Carney: What does the evaluation take into account?
Mr. Lucas: It takes into account whether you have tried any other drugs, and whether those have been effective or not.
Senator Carney: Would it be similar to, if I want to use an arthritis drug that is not covered by the health plan, I have to show that I have used several other drugs before I can get this covered by the health plan. Is that the same kind of thing? Do you have to show that you have done other things?
Mr. Lucas: You have to show that you have done other things. I can show you a more dramatic example of that.
There is a very famous case, the Terry Parker case. He suffers from epilepsy and seizures. They recommended that he go through a lobotomy before trying medical marijuana.
Senator Carney: The evaluation comes back within three to six months. You have waited for your specialists.
Mr. Lucas: Here is the rub, Senator Carney. You have waited for six months; you have obtained your permission from the government. You now have a piece of paper that does not lead you anywhere. It does not allow you to have access to anything because there is no government access now. It leads you to the same street corner unfortunately, where you were probably buying your cannabis beforehand. If you are lucky enough to be one of the few cities that has a compassion society nearby, then you might be able to access this.
Senator Carney: So there is no place to go from there?
Mr. Lucas: No. Health Canada so far has issued a 1,000 pieces of paper in this three-year program. That is all they have done.
Senator Carney: Health Canada may say that the minister's statement says there is a problem in the quality issue and the standardization issue. Can you comment on that?
Mr. Lucas: I think that right now with medical needs that we are seeing, the only concern should be the safety of the product, if it is safe or not. We are just being told that they have ended up with 78 strains instead of the one or two strains that they were looking for. We, of course, offered our services and genetics to try and prevent that. We are seeing right now that it is costing the government time and money to repair that problem. But even worst of all, people like myself who are waiting for a safe supply, are still waiting.
We feel that Health Canada should be picking up plants and products and at least getting it out to sick people on a compassionate basis. Research can follow. As you all know, there has been ample research done on medical marijuana safety.
Senator Carney: Now, Health Canada says that it is getting seeds, or wanted to get its seeds, I forget, from the U.S. Could you comment on that? I mean, why would Health Canada look to the U.S. rather than to buy Canada?
Mr. Lucas: Well, we are very frustrated by the huge influence the U.S. has on this. The fact that they call themselves the only legal distributor of seeds in North American is a bit arrogant considering that Canada is actually able to produce its own seeds, certainly within B.C.
The NIDA Program has been able to distribute cannabis. Canada is not the first country to do this. This is often stated by Health Canada. The U.S. has been doing it for close to 30 years now. They have been able to do this without showing significant harm at all to those who have been using it for the last 20 years, even though the product has been judged to be substandard by any user or any researchers who have looked at it. I would like to refer you to Dr. Ethan Russo's study on the long-term effects of cannabis, which has recently been published in the Journal of Cannabis Therapeutic.
Senator Carney: Do you know why this contract went to Manitoba rather than British Columbia?
Mr. Lucas: We feel that because of the overlying security concerns, probably having it at the bottom of a mine really sort of tickled Health Canada. I am under the understanding that this is a higher security area and a model for military installations. I am not sure if they are worried about the plants escaping or whatnot.
Senator Carney: B.C. growers bid on this plan. Do you have any information about what happened to the B.C. bid?
Mr. Lucas: It appeared that they had outstanding security concerns that they felt would be met by the mines themselves. I would like to think that if Health Canada was doing this, they might have done it to a couple of different organizations so that there would be a competitive process.
Senator Carney: Yes, it would make sense to have a variety of suppliers instead of one.
You said that of your 200-odd clients, 15 have licences to use.
Mr. Lucas: Yes, 15 or 20.
Senator Carney: What is the status of the others if they are non-licensed users?
Mr. Lucas: They are non-licensed users, but they have all a doctor's permission to use cannabis. They are the same as anyone who would go out and get any other medicine. Their doctors have written recommendations for them to be able to register in our operation.
Senator Carney: So to use the services of your non-profit society, you have to have a doctor's recommendation?
Mr. Lucas: Absolutely. Then we follow up with either a phone call to the doctor's office, or fax confirmation. As far as I know, we are tighter in terms of our security than any pharmacy in Canada.
Senator Carney: Yes. Where do you get your supply?
Mr. Lucas: About 70 per cent of our supply is grown by a few contracted suppliers. That allows us to monitor the safety aspects of how it is grown, as well as trying to get genetics that we know help certain conditions. About 30 per cent of our supply comes from a few other smaller suppliers. We have a priority of organic products. Safety is always first concern.
Senator Carney: How do you test that?
Mr. Lucas: You cannot test for safer THC content — or you can do it, but it is an expensive process.
Senator Carney: Do you do quality control from your suppliers?
Mr. Lucas: Oh, absolutely. The growth conditions make a big difference. A clean grow area and the use of safe products is the first concern. Safe grow methods are very much the same as those established for growing tomatoes in a hydroponic system in a greenhouse. There are food-standard fertilizers and food-standard pesticides; there is a focus on organic products as well.
Senator Carney: What is the relationship between your society and the Victoria police? I have noticed that the Victoria Council has become the second municipality in B.C. that formally supports the decriminalization of marijuana use from physicians for medicinal purposes. By the way, what is the first municipality?
Mr. Lucas: North Vancouver in 1998.
Senator Carney: What is your experience with the police, given the fact that obviously the police are not ignoring this because you have had the personal experience.
Mr. Lucas: The original bust was in Oak Bay; our troubles were originally with the Oak Bay Police.
Senator Carney: Oak Bay is a separate municipality.
Mr. Lucas: Yes, it is a neighbouring municipality. We are now in Victoria City itself, and we have not had any trouble with the local police. Unfortunately, we have to act on a sort of ``do not ask, do not tell'' kind of basis. Ideally, we would love to have a police liaison so that issues such as members being harassed or having their cannabis confiscated — which does occur on a regular basis from police — could be dealt with more expediently.
Senator Carney: The police have told us that they do not prosecute individual possession. I think was that not Vancouver? What has been your experience in Oak Bay and Victoria?
Mr. Lucas: That is a very good question. In fact, the last time that the senate sub committee came to town I was in New York City and I submitted written brief. I provided you with some information on arrest statistics culled from actual police forces. I know you get information from a lot of different sources, and I thought the police Web site would be a great way to deal with that.
On their Web site, the Vancouver Police report that between 1999 and 2000 — those are the years where the most recent statistics are available — arrests for personal use tripled. While you are being told that people are no longer being arrested or brought for personal possession, their numbers just do not add up. That is easily verifiable with the local police force. Those are numbers that are verifiable all through Canada. In fact, the RCMP arrest statistics for personal use have also gone up in recent years.
[Translation]
Anything you say here, Mr. Lucas, is privileged information, under our parliamentary rules. You enjoy immunity and I have asked my colleague not to pursue the matter. It is in your best interest, since a judge is set to rule on this matter.
[English]
Mr. Lucas, this is a parliamentary committee. Of course, being a parliamentary committee, the members of the committee and the witnesses enjoy parliamentary privilege, which includes immunity from being prosecuted for whatever is said here.
Does your organization follow the same pattern and principle that the Vancouver Compassion Club follows in terms of making the files, and documenting all the information for all your membership? Do you have a similar system that Ms Black is maintaining for the Vancouver Compassion Club?
Mr. Lucas: Before I started the organization I had a chance to visit with Hilary Black, whom I am happy to call a friend. Without her hard work and the work of her organization, medical marijuana in Canada would not be where it is today. We followed the same principles absolutely, which include doctors' recommendations for membership. I think mutual documentation of any purchases that are made. We have also added a few conditions that I think the Vancouver club has added since then. We make all of our members sign contracts stating they won't resell any of the products purchased at our organization and that they will use it in the privacy of their own home. Now once again, it is not my job to tell sick people where to use their medicine, but it is the belief that unfortunately in this climate anything that endangers any of our membership, such as using around the area, could be a danger to our organization. I am happy to say that the Vancouver club does not have to impose such restrictions on its members.
The Chairman: Do you favour the maintaining of a good relationship between a doctor and your members?
Mr. Lucas: Absolutely.
The Chairman: Because the doctor is key in the follow-up of the use of marijuana as a cure.
Mr. Lucas: In terms of the medical use, a doctor is very important. For personal use, I think it is a different issue. I would also like to mention that 80 per cent of the members who are referred to our organization today come directly from doctors. We deal with about 70 doctors in Victoria and they send their patients directly to us.
The Chairman: I know you have had some major problems. I heard Ms Black in Vancouver. You have a major problem with the actual regulation. We are trying to, as they say in politics, make the best of almost nothing.
We are going to have to report on the actual regulation. We understand your point on free access and no regulation, no government control between the relationship between the doctor and the client. We understand that.
Mr. Lucas: Senator Nolin, if this system worked, if the medical system worked, then I would not have to argue for full-scale decriminalization. That would be a different argument for me. But the system, the medical system does not work. The only solution that I can see is decriminalization or legalization. I would like to speak on this if you have any questions.
The Chairman: We are going to be reporting in August. Let us use that specific chapter on the implementation of the new regulation, and let us assume that the health minister is looking only at that chapter and saying, ``Maybe I should make some changes on the regulation.'' She is not going to change the law. She will only work into manoeuvering something in the regulations. What should she change to make it better?
Mr. Lucas: The first thing that should be changed is that one doctor recommending for one patient should be enough by any means to allow Health Canada to sanction the process.
The Chairman: One doctor?
Mr. Lucas: One doctor.
The Chairman: Could that be a family doctor?
Mr. Lucas: Absolutely, a family doctor. It should be something that if we are talking about anything longer than 10- day turn-around time for an application, that people are suffering.
The Chairman: Paperwork shortened.
As you know, I think it is important for anybody who is not familiar with the regulation, the basic structure of the regulation was built on the self-cultivation. That was the assumption taken by the government in the regulation. Of course some patients cannot, for medical reasons, cannot cultivate, so they can have access to a third party providing the substance. That third party cannot provide for more than three.
Mr. Lucas: They can only take care of one, but they can take care of three sites on one location.
The Chairman: Do you have something to say about that? Let us start the distribution process and access to the substance.
Mr. Lucas: Let us assume that I am very sick with hepatitis C and I am not able to grow for myself, that I am bedridden. It is presumptuous for the government to assume that I am going to know someone who is going to want to do it for me, or to be able to do it for me.
The Chairman: That triggers the question of accessing secure, valid, and properly grown substance.
Mr. Lucas: It should also be clear that there is not even a legal source of seed, so no matter what, even if you are growing your own, you have to start by breaking the law. Someone has to sell you the seed for you to start up. There is not a single Canadian user right now who has been able to go through this process without at least initially breaking the law in purchasing seed. Someone has had to sell them seeds. It is a completely flawed system.
The Chairman: I am not telling you that regulation is solving all the problems. I am suggesting that we try to recommend some changes that are feasible rapidly. Of course, we can recommend that the law be changed, but that is something else. Let us try to keep the patients in mind. Let us hope to have some changes by Christmas.
Mr. Lucas: Let us talk about cultivation of scale then. If we remove the regulations that state that one person can grow only for one individual, and we could have one person that grows for, say, 20 individuals, we can then have a semblance of scale that people can work with financially.
Otherwise, right now there are 1,000 Canadians who are allowed to use medical marijuana. If only one person is allowed to grow for each of those people, or let us say three sites per location — everyone has got someone who grows — we have just okayed 330 different grow operations to pop up all through Canada. That just does not seem like the right way to go.
If we can have organizations, such as compassion clubs, and put experienced growers together with those who need it the most on a non-profit basis, with a very clear mandate, we can operate as compassion societies with basically glass ceilings. We like for everything to be very transparent so people can see our financial records and what is going on. I think that would be the best way to solve the problem right now.
The Chairman: Keeping in mind that the harsh reality of controlling illegal drugs and the existence of that regulation, would you accept control by governments of your operation?
Mr. Lucas: I do not think the government understands it.
The Chairman: Let us assume that they understand it. Let us say that they become convinced that it would be a good thing to use the various compassion clubs around the country as one way of distributing the substance, but in exchange, the quid pro quo would be a lot of control, what would be your reaction?
Mr. Lucas: Honourable senators, if Health Canada right now could help out all 235 of our members with the same kindness, efficiency, consideration as we are able to help them, then I would gladly walk away from the operation and let Health Canada take over. I am not convinced that they are able to do that. That would be no problem.
Senator Carney: We have here the regulations on the Health Canada medical access to marijuana. Supplemental to what you have said here this afternoon, could you consider giving us some written alternatives or suggestions to make these regulations work better? That would be helpful to the committee. You cannot possibly do that in half an hour.
Mr. Lucas: I belong to the Canadian Cannabis Coalition, which has already written a document advising Health Canada on how they can shape their research as well as distribute cannabis in a compassionate manner specifically dealing with those regulations. I am happy to put those forward. Our organization has also written a critique of the new regulations, and I will make that available to the committee.
The Chairman: Try to keep in mind that let us try to come up with long-term change, but also fast, short-term changes that are feasible.
Senator Carney: They say it takes a year or 10 years to change the law, but you can change a regulation on the golf course if you can find three people to sign.
Mr. Lucas: Well, I do hope that the senators are prepared to remind Health Canada that this is not something they are doing off the top of their heads. They have been court ordered to do this, and they are ignoring their court-ordered mandate, as far as I am concerned.
The Chairman: It will be one chapter only of the report. We have those new regulations. We would have commented on section 56, but we do not have section 56 anymore. We will comment on the new regulation.
Mr. Lucas: I urge you to look at section 53 as well. That section deals with doctors' permission to prescribe anything they feel is helpful to the patient. Thank you very much.
The Chairman: Thank you.
We will now hear from City of Richmond Councillor Linda Barnes.
Ms Linda Barnes, City Councillor, City of Richmond: Thank you for having me here to represent the city and our drug strategy. I am the Chairperson of the Community Safety Committee, which encompasses all of the enforcements here in Richmond. As such, I am the chair of the drug strategy project here in Richmond. I am here just to give you a brief synopsis of where the city is, and what we have been doing in and around our drug strategy.
Our strategy started back in 1999 when Richmond was dealing with rising concerns on drug-related crimes. We looked at the significant numbers of marijuana grow operations here in Richmond. In addition to fueling the illegal drug trade, grow operations pose a serious safety hazard because of the risk from fire, destruction, and property values, and threat to the safety and sense of the public order as well as from violent break-ins and other crimes associated with the grow ops.
We were experiencing a high number of those and the spin-offs. In addition, the community was experiencing increasing property crimes. The police attribute up to 80 per cent of the property crimes to drug users seeking to support their drug habit or drug trade. Based on these concerns, in March of 2000 the previous mayor recommended that the city establish a task force of community leaders and stakeholders to address issues around drugs and crime. The task force was inspired by the City of Vancouver's success in establishing a community coalition to deal with similar issues.
Throughout 2000 the task force conducted its research and discussions aimed at drafting an overall strategy and a work plan. An extensive plan was based on the principles of a five-pillar approach which included the traditional pillars of education, prevention, treatment, harm reduction and enforcement, along with the fifth pillar of inter-agency cooperation, which was felt to be an integral part of this strategy. The draft work plan, which included numerous recommendations covering the five pillar areas, was taken to the community for consultation and feedback. Council allocated funding to carry out these recommendations.
Early in 2001, the city underwent a major re-organization the new community safety division, to which I just referred, was established. This innovative division combined RCMP, fire, emergency services, and bylaw enforcement in a single administrative grouping. It was designed to bring greater integration and coordination among the municipal services dealing with public safety issues. Responsibility for the task force on drugs and crime was assigned to the new community safety division, and further action was deferred until a vision and strategy could be developed for the new division.
In late 2001, the city successfully applied for funding through the FCM pilot program to develop a municipal drug strategy. This allowed the city to start and complete the work begun by the previous task force. I was appointed as the council liaison for the program.
My staff and I have formed a working group, which, with direction of council, is developing a plan for the completion of this strategy. A stakeholder advisory group is currently being formed to provide input on development of the strategy from the community. A needs assessment will be performed over the summer. Additional public consultation with the community-at-large is planned before work begins on drafting the actual strategy.
The work of the former task force has provided a good foundation for the development of a municipal drug strategy. They gathered a whole lot of facts and did some preliminary work with the community to find out what their problems and concerns were here. We are now going to take that to form an action plan to address the concerns expressed. Our current focus is to refine those recommendations, design an action plan that is achievable and measurable at a local level through cooperation with grass roots organizations. An inter-agency cooperation is the key to the success of any drug strategy. Sustainable solutions cannot be accomplished in isolation.
Solutions must cross-organizational and governmental boundaries to address the root causes of drug-related issues and to mobilize the full resources as needed to address these issues. We can only do so much at the local level. We are trying to gather the efforts of the local organizations, pull them together to provide that forum so that they can access the outer places that can actually provide the services and the funding to do that.
The local government has little direct impact on drug laws or related services in treatment, education, prevention and harm reduction — that is your job. However, the city does believe it has a valuable role to play in providing leadership and coordination amongst the diverse local agencies and the stakeholders dealing with drug-related issues. We expect our new strategy to be ready early 2002.
We have not given any particular focus to issues surrounding marijuana and/or decriminalization. I feel it would be inappropriate for the city or council to comment on that issue until we have had a real chance to fully consult with our stakeholders and the community, to gauge their opinions and have drafted a drug strategy that is based on community consensus. We are just not there yet. We are sort of right in the middle of our process. In the meantime, we are continuing to deal with drug-related issues such as grow ops, other related crimes.
Superintendent Clapham, the officer in charge here in Richmond, will address you later. He will discuss some of the initiatives we have taken. One of those initiatives is Operation Green Clean. Briefly, this program involves the combined efforts of the RCMP, fire, bylaw enforcement, and other agencies, in a coordinated education and enforcement effort to raise public awareness of the issues surrounding grow ops, and to prevent their further proliferation in the community.
We have had a large success that Superintendent Clapham will describe in more detail. This has been an effective program. It is evidence of what can happen when there is effective inter-agency cooperation. We believe we can repeat these successes in other areas, including prevention, education, and treatment, by working together with our fellow community stakeholders as we design our overall municipal drug strategy.
That is the city's presentation in relation to where the City of Richmond is in our deliberations in drug strategy so far. As I said, we are not at the point where we feel that we have gathered everything to be able to give you a full community statement.
I would like to talk to you a little bit about my personal feelings and the issues that I have found, both as an individual and as a youth worker at a secondary school. I would not want to comment on what the school policy is, or an individual school.
I have observed that our youth are truly getting a mixed message. They do not understand whether marijuana is legal or illegal. I see this when I speak to the youth, when I have to talk to them after they have had a suspension. On the one hand, they believe it is socially acceptable in some way or another to be using marijuana. But on the other hand, if they are caught, they are suspended and/or arrested. They are getting true mixed messages.
Interestingly, a recent group that was suspended and had a visit from our local RCMP officer said, ``If we had known it was this big a deal, we would never have done it.'' That mixed message is, in my opinion, very, very difficult for kids. They do not know which way to turn. The line is blurred. The other comment is, ``You should have told us this would happen.'' Now, they have been told. They were all told the rules at the beginning of the year. But from the youth's perspective then they get the mixed message from their peer groups, from society, all the rest, and so they forget what they have been told, or at least that is what they claim. They do not seem to have any concept that they are contributing to grow ops, to what the crime problems are associated with those, the danger that is associated with those. They do not see that there is a connection with other drugs.
The comment is when people of the sixties and the seventies were teenagers, they did it, and now they are okay. They do not see the connection. I know that there are lots of studies out there to the opposite, but they do not see that there is a connection with their use or selling of marijuana with the organized crime and their contribution to that whole area.
Those are some observations that I wanted to share with you. Those are from the youth. The mixed message is very difficult for kids.
The Chairman: From a professional point of view, you are involved in the youth education. What kind of information are they getting now and who is delivering that information? Not on the illegality of the substance and the harsh sanctions that are consequence of using it, but drugs in general? I am including in that alcohol, tobacco, and the various psychoactive substances — including illegal ones.
What kind of information are youths receiving? I am alluding to the first three of the four pillars that we are used to.
Ms Barnes: There is a lot of information available to the youths, both at the school level and in the community. They are read the rules from a school board, school administration viewpoint, and those are laid out with consequences. You know, ``if you do this, this is what you can expect.'' They make sure everyone gets that message at the beginning of the year.
However, throughout the year, that message can be lost to a 14 or 15-year-old in day-to-day life. If the child, parent or the school asks, there is a lot of information out there. However, they have to make the effort to find the information and that is not exactly what youth are into. I am not sure if that answers your question.
The Chairman: Yes, it is a similar situation in the rest of the country. We have a problem understanding the quality of information to reach out. I know that Senator Kenny has studied a lot in the tobacco area. Why the message is so clear for many Canadians, but it is not reaching out to those who are really affected.
It puzzles me; everyone talks about education and information, but that is not exactly what we are doing here. Lining up a lot of sanctions and ``do's and don'ts.'' Of course, we are saying, ``Hey, do it. It is going to be in to do it because everybody is against you.'' But that is the kind of dilemma we are in.
Senator Kenny: What you described in terms of the education process, sounded to me a little bit like it a description of what the rules and regulations were. Is that correct?
Ms Barnes: Yes.
Senator Kenny: What you are essentially doing is saying, ``If you do this, then here are the consequences.'' Is this what your school education about drugs is?
Ms Barnes: That is only a part of it.
Senator Kenny: Can you describe the other part of the education process that goes on in schools?
Ms Barnes: It can depend on the school. We have what we call career and personal planning, which includes a component on making good decisions. We also involve specific groups such as RADAT, the Richmond Action Drug and Alcohol Team, a group that works with people with drug addictions. That is available in some form to all students within the Richmond school system. There are also counselling services available to students who are having trouble.
Senator Kenny: What is the definition of ``trouble''?
Ms Barnes: If a student has been absent for any length of time, if there is any concern that a student may be having some difficulties and may be at risk for drug or alcohol abuse, those kinds of things.
Senator Kenny: What constitutes abuse?
Ms Barnes: Any use that the school can determine, especially on the school grounds. That is sort of where our limited part is. Although if a student has said, ``No, I do not use on the school grounds, but I use off school grounds,'' we will recommend that he or she see a counsellor and ensure that there is further outside education or counselling available to them.
Senator Kenny: What age are the counsellors?
Ms Barnes: The counsellors in the school are a variety of ages.
Senator Kenny: Are there any peer-age counsellors? Are kids talking to other kids?
Ms Barnes: Every school is a little different. I hesitate to comment on all schools. I know that some schools have peer-helping programs, and there are peer-tutoring programs. Now, I would hesitate to comment on that. I believe that there are, but I cannot say for sure.
Senator Kenny: It seems to fall into a basket of things that are difficult to communicate between generations. It is like talking about sex with a different generation; parents have difficulty talking to their children, and vice versa, on the subject. Most of the information seems to come from peers. If that is the case, do you have any way of determining whether the peer counselling is effective or not, or whether the adults or youth counselling is effective or not?
Ms Barnes: I can only give you some anecdotes. I have no professional background to actually say ``yea'' or ``nay'' to either of those questions. Peer groups are important to kids. Yet, a relationship with someone of my age can be equally effective as that with somebody in his or her own age group. It certainly is easier if you have kids who are trained as peer counsellors, peer helpers, to work with kids, because they are often in the same place at the right time with their peers; adults are not necessarily hanging out behind the school grounds. However, I believe that when you have a relationship with a young person, the age is much less important.
Senator Kenny: How would you characterize the values that are inherent in the counselling the school gives?
Ms Barnes: They are very individual. I would not want to comment on them. I mean, every person is an individual.
Senator Kenny: Is there a program or a syllabus? The guidance counsellors must have some direction that they follow. Has anyone analyzed it in terms of the bias that is inherent in it?
Ms Barnes: That is a very good question. I do not know that.
Senator Kenny: I am asking that, because last night in Saskatoon we heard at some length from students who bought into counselling, if you will, until they discovered their parents were users. Then they were offended with the hypocrisy of it.
Ms Barnes: Yes.
Senator Kenny: I am trying to determine how one does counsel young people in terms of cigarettes. I am very conscious of the four main motivators: One is losing weight; one is peer pressure, and one is hero worship, and the other is rebelling from authority figures. The authority figures category applies as much to kids who are looking at marijuana as it does to cigarettes.
Ms Barnes: I would certainly agree with you there.
Senator Kenny: Peer pressure has the same impact as well. If your peers think those things, then you may well be in.
Ms Barnes: I am obviously a child of the sixties or seventies and that certainly is one of the questions that students have asked me. In my case the answer is no. I will tell them that ``as a young person, that is not something I did, but you have your choices to make. What we are talking about is your choices. What kinds of things that you look at, and how do you make those decisions.''
We redirect them onto what they are looking at. Certainly there is hypocrisy when a parent says ``I smoke'' or ``I drink'' or ``These are the problems that I do not want you to be involved in, and these are the reasons why.'' A child will always say, ``Yeah, but you do it, so it has got to be okay.'' Whether you are a counsellor, a parent, or a neighbour, any adult will face those kinds of things. However, does that mean that we do not want our children or our youth to be better than what we were, or to benefit from our mistakes?
Senator Kenny: The question I guess that is being begged is, ``is it a mistake?''
Ms Barnes: I think that is an individual choice for a child whether to break the law or not to break the law. I would rather have an informed choice based on knowledge of the legal, social and health related consequences so that they have a broader understanding of what they are doing, instead of just trying to say, ``I am rebelling because I am a 15 year old person.''
Senator Carney: I have questions in two areas: One, that I find your statement on the attitude of youth very useful when you say it is a mixed message. Although I would add that telling kids they have a choice to legal or illegal activity would be, in my mind, blurring the message too. That was my experience as a parent.
The population of Richmond is at least a third Asian, if not more.
Ms Barnes: More.
Senator Carney: What is it, about 40 per cent now?
Ms Barnes: Yes.
Senator Carney: Is there cultural differences in regard to pattern of use around use of marijuana by the youth in the schools? Is there any observable culture between Asians and non-Asians?
Ms Barnes: We plan to collect that data over the summer. I do not have any figures to answer that question, but that is certainly one of the questions that I would ask.
Senator Carney: That would be interesting given what you have said about family backgrounds and that.
How does the use of marijuana among youth in the school system compare to use of alcohol and tobacco, which are both illegal in their age groups: more, less, or about the same?
Ms Barnes: Again I do not have particular stats. I can give you an opinion if that is helpful.
Senator Carney: Yes.
Ms Barnes: I would say that more students smoke cigarettes than anything. Then I would say alcohol, and then marijuana.
The Chairman: In that order?
Ms Barnes: Yes. However, I want to qualify that is strictly my observation.
Senator Carney: Yes, but it helps us shape the problem for that.
The Chairman: Are you going to collect that this summer?
Ms Barnes: I believe that that will be a part of it, yes.
The Chairman: Do you have a big budget?
Ms Barnes: No.
The Chairman: Do a good job. Take more than two months and do a good job. I am telling you only two provinces have such data. At the federal level, the most recent data are from 1994.
Ms Barnes: I know it is very difficult.
The Chairman: It is very difficult and it costs a lot. However, if you have the resources to do it, you should. We would encourage you to do it, but do it properly.
Senator Carney: It is a self-identifying issue too. You do not want to identify yourself as a user.
The Chairman: Two provinces gave that research to researchers, scientific, and in the Province of Quebec, it took a year and a half to come up with solid data. When you are listing psychoactive substances, the first one is alcohol.
Senator Carney: I just want to shift the focus to the community initiatives you have undertaken in developing your drug policy. The information we have is that the Vancouver Police Department has stated that a lot of the problems in Vancouver come from the outlying areas. Surrey springs to mind, as a source of the problems and relationship between drugs and crime in Vancouver. If you ask me where a relationship would be, I would say it would be Surrey and Vancouver. I would not necessarily think of Richmond.
You stated that the Richmond task force is reviewing its own situation in order to determine the extent of the problem and find solutions that are relevant to the community. Why did you undertake that? Are there statistics indicating a relationship between drug use and crime, or were you just trying to find out if one in fact existed?
Ms Barnes: Most of our information is more anecdotal as opposed to hard numbers because they are hard to get. We are looking at some of the RCMP stats. We are also looking at is some of the crime patterns, for an example; some of the corridors where those occur, where the arrests are made and the people who are involved in those. These are some places where we get information.
Anecdotally, youth are quite open about the fact that that, if they are looking to get something, they can find it much easier on the street in Vancouver. In their view, if they simply walk down some known streets, they will be approached to buy all sorts of drugs. It is much more hidden here in Richmond. I am not saying that we definitely have a problem. But it looks different. Therefore, our needs are different. How we are dealing with it is different.
Senator Carney: I have a final question: Is the strategy that you are developing within the context of the present law on drugs, or are you dealing with options of decriminalization or changes?
Ms Barnes: No. We are looking specifically at where we are right now.
Senator Carney: Within the present?
Ms Barnes: That is correct.
The Chairman: I have one question and it deals with prevention. Maybe it is a loaded question, but I will ask it: What kind of prevention are you talking about?
Ms Barnes: Prevention for?
The Chairman: Prevention of crime or prevention of abuse? Reading your material it is prevention of crime.
Ms Barnes: It is. I would personally take it a little bit further. It is prevention of use.
Mr. Ward Clapham, Superintendent, RCMP: Honourable senators, I have a short opening talk and then I would like to use the remaining time for question and answers.
I am the officer in charge of Richmond RCMP Detachment. I want to begin by thanking committee members on behalf of the Richmond Detachment. I have been a peace officer for 22 years. Five of those years, I was undercover primarily in the area of drug operations. I speak on behalf of 210 RCMP officers stationed at Richmond Detachment, which is Canada's third largest RCMP Detachment we have in Canada. Richmond Detachment is considered one of the most forward thinking and progressive police services in Canada. We welcome the examination of drug policy issues.
I have some just general statistics for you. The production of marijuana commonly referred to here in this province as ``grow ops,'' or grow operations in Richmond, in 1998 we had 49 report grow ops; in 2001 we had 366 reported; and we are estimating for the year 2002, 392 reported grow operations in our city.
The question is how many have not been reported to us, and how many have gone undetected? I cannot give you an exact answer; I do not know if we are getting 25 per cent, 50 per cent, or 10 per cent. However, members, police officers at this detachment could not keep up with the complaints pertaining to this type of call for service.
Last October, we established Operation Green Clean, a comprehensive, holistic approach to dealing with grow ops. It is a partnership between municipal government, the integrated service teams here at Richmond, homeowners and property management companies, neighbours, media, the Residential Tenancy Branch, community police volunteers, and our British Columbia Hydro.
Our short-term goals were to increase landlord awareness, reduce reported marijuana grow operations, ensure that the buildings previously used for grow operations are safe, and to reduce fire and physical risk to the Richmond community.
Our initial response was a number of meetings with various representatives and partners, including the building department, health department, and the city solicitor. Here in Richmond we have a community safety division — which is, I believe, the only one in Canada — the Richmond Fire Rescue and the RCMP. Operation Green Clean includes an awareness component, which is a pamphlet you have before you explaining about the Green Clean initiative.
The operation also works to increase landlord awareness. We have a 90-minute seminar aimed at property owners of single-family dwellings. We cover areas of crime prevention: What is a marijuana grow operation; the damage and financial loss of grow operations; the problems with insurance claims; how to screen prospective renters; brief explanation of the Landlord and Tenancy Act in British Columbia and the Crime-free Addendum; and how to conduct continual assessments of their property. We also had a broad media campaign advertising the seminar and a communication strategy where we focused on bringing this awareness to the community.
The Green Clean concept also includes an enforcement component. That is a dedicated target group of police officers strictly attacking, dismantling, and putting out of business the grow operations we have here in the city. We are working with the City of Richmond on a bylaw to deal with safety inspections. We are working with community impact statements to bring to the courts the community harm that a grow operation and that marijuana brings to our community. We have dedicated school liaison officers who bring an educational component to the schools to teach about marijuana and marijuana grow ops.
One of the things loud and clear that we notice with marijuana grow operations is that the majority of these files also include additional offences which could be occurrences of flooding, water, electrical fire, break, enter and theft, home invasions, sexual assaults. We have had one homicide in the past two years as a result of a marijuana grow operation break-in and theft that went bad.
In the area of possession of marijuana under 30 grams, in 1998 we had 405 reported, 55 charged; in the year 2000 we had 700 reported, 40 charged; and in 2001 we had 605 reported, 30 charged. As a result of our efforts and focus on our marijuana problems — which have been increasing — our statistics on self-generated work in the area of heroin has decreased significantly. We had 86 reported heroin offences in 1998, we had 86; and in 2001, we only had 38, with eight charged. This is a self-generated or a proactive area. The heroin area is the toughest area for investigations. That has gone down because our efforts had to go at dealing with marijuana.
Senator Carney: You did not say how many of the 86 were charged.
Mr. Clapham: I do not have that with me right now. I am sorry, I do not have that in my notes.
Regarding the legalization of cannabis marijuana, we do not support the legalization of any currently illicit substance. Regarding the decriminalization of cannabis marijuana, we do not support the decriminalization of any current illicit substance. We do not support any initiatives that encourage and increase use of an illicit substance.
Those who traffic in illicit drugs destroy lives, homes and communities. Communities need to be protected, and those offenders need to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Decriminalization or legalization is not the solution.
I have been lecturing, teaching, and involved very heavily in the area of community policing for the past seven years throughout Canada and in the United States. Community policing is all about root problem solving in partnership with our community. If you were to ask, ``where is the future of community policing going?'' I would suggest that it is moving into the area of integration. Integration of services and the integration of efforts in attempts to root problem solve through partnerships and keeping our community healthy, well, and safe.
The City of Richmond's community safety division brings together the police, the fire rescue bylaws, and emergency programming, emergency management, and environment, all under one kind of manager, with the idea that we work together in a more integrated approach as we recognize there is only one tax payer. We are starting to work smarter. An example of the integration in the city would be the Green Clean, where the city came on board to help us deal with more in the prevention and the areas of awareness and education.
I believe that we must approach our drug issue in the same way. Integration has brought the community to recognize that the drug problem is not just a police problem; it is a community problem. As a result, we need to take an integrated approach to dealing with the drug problem. Enforcement of drug laws is just part of the solution. We must integrate our approach with treatment, rehabilitation, prevention, education, awareness, and enforcement.
It is our worry that the line drawn regarding drugs is already blurry. It is blurry because our gateway drugs start with nicotine and then alcohol. Decriminalizing marijuana or legalizing marijuana will just blur the lines more. Another way to put it is like this: Any move towards decriminalization or legalization of marijuana will weaken our moral disapproval of the drug use. It will also weaken the perception of the risk of harm.
I would like to share with you two examples of where we are already seeing the weakening of perception of harm. One is in the area of gambling. In this community, there is a casino without slot machines. The discussion right now within this community is whether to expand gaming towards letting slot machines into the casino. I am not going to enter into the moral issue of this blurred line.
The Chairman: The Supreme Court will deal with that this fall.
Mr. Clapham: The challenge is that the line is already blurred in the area of gaming. Another example of weakening of perception of harm in this province is that beer and wine stores are now looking at selling hard liquor. Again, the question to be asked: What is the difference? Now that the line is already blurred, I mean, a lot of people are saying, ``Well, you can buy beer and wine. Why not be able to buy hard stuff in a liquor store?''
Our question goes to marijuana. If we decriminalize or legalize it, will it stop there? Do then we say to our children, ``It is okay to smoke marijuana, but not hashish. Stay away from ecstasy and maybe just a little bit of cocaine.'' We are worried about that blurred line.
What is the message be that we would be sending to our youth? We, as the police, say it would be disastrous. Do we want to say to our children, ``Drugs are okay''? Now, I have personally witnessed time and time again that cannabis is the foundation upon which most young people begin experimenting with illicit drugs. They do not wake up one morning and just decide to go right into heroin.
This is a problem here in Richmond like every other city or town. Therefore, it is essential to understand cannabis in the context of the drug use continuum and not solely in isolation.
Most of our youth respect drug laws and the harm that they cause. Why would we ever jeopardize this? Youth safety is one of the RCMP's top priorities. It is also a top priority here for the RCMP at Richmond. Especially vulnerable are our kids, our youth at risk.
Cannabis today is up to 500 per cent higher in THC, from 5 per cent now up to 31 per cent, than the cannabis that most adults remember from the sixties and seventies. I have seen the effects that it has had on community safety, on community wellness, on crime, and on damage to our youth over the years.
Everyone has an opinion. But as your national police service, we would suggest that our opinion is very informed. We are saying that decriminalization or legalization is not the solution. We have enough problems in our community already. This would only complicate matters and ultimately cause more problems.
Finally, I just want to share with you a personal story. My six-year-old is just learning how to read. A couple of days ago, we were in the grocery store buying an ice cream. All over the counters and on the glass were messages, ``Smoking Kills,'' ``You will die from smoking,'' and ``One out of two smokers will die from smoking.'' She asked, ``Daddy, why do people smoke?'' I really did not come up with a very good or quick answer. I tried to just explain, ``Well sweetie, they cannot stop. They are addicted. They are hooked. It is not that they want to die. They are hooked. They are addicted.''
I would like to conclude with this statement, and through legalization why would we encourage cannabis? Does it not follow that there is the same amount of harm that would result from smoking cannabis as tobacco? What do we want to say to our kids, ``Smoking kills, but it is okay now to smoke marijuana?''
The answer, we believe, is an integration of a number of strategies: Through reducing the demand, reducing the supply, and a pillar approach, be it four pillars or six pillars, including awareness, prevention, education, treatment, rehabilitation and enforcement.
Senator Kenny: In your discussion with your daughter, did you mention to her how many died in Canada each year as a result of tobacco-related diseases?
Mr. Clapham: No.
Senator Kenny: Do you know the number?
Mr. Clapham: No.
Senator Kenny: It is 45,000. Do people die from cannabis-related diseases?
Mr. Clapham: Do we have statistics on that?
The Chairman: Yes.
Mr. Clapham: Okay, I am listening.
The Chairman: Zero. We are not saying it is not a dangerous substance. We are not at all suggesting that. We are talking of the abuse of the substance. That is what we are focusing on. But nobody dies of it.
Mr. Clapham: You have said that 45,000 people die from smoking-related disease.
The Chairman: Each year.
Mr. Clapham:. How many of those people were cannabis users in conjunction with tobacco? Now, did any of those smoke cannabis? Did that help contribute at all?
The Chairman: We do not have research for that. We have a blur in information. Most of cannabis users are tobacco users and volume for volume, cannabis cause more problem to your lungs than tobacco. However, we have not seen any research that indicates that cannabis users are using as high a volume as tobacco in a day, or week, or a year.
Mr. Clapham: In my undercover experience, I did not see anybody using cannabis marijuana with some type of a filter system. I am certainly no expert in the area of health, but I would suggest that there was no filter used. I do not know what that harm would have contributed to any deaths.
Senator Kenny: Filters are a fraud perpetrated by tobacco companies on consumers. They do not do any good. They may cause greater sales, but they do not in fact improve your likelihood of survival. I only raise the point, sir, because it struck me as being an unusual comparison. It is a bit like chalk and cheese.
I did want to ask why you do not support a more liberalized approach to marijuana given all of the problems that seem to come with it: the grow houses, the problems with dealers, the concerns you have for property values, and other issues like that? If it were a regulated product controlled by the government, would these issues not diminish? We may have other issues that replace them, but would the issues that you are addressing right now not diminish and change?
Mr. Clapham: No. If you ask any police officer if they took drugs and alcohol away and they all disappeared, would we be still in business, and most of us would say, ``We would not be very busy.'' I would suggest that blurring the line by sending a message that it is now okay to use drugs is going to cause us more problems. It will send a message that now it is okay to start putting a harmful substance into your body, a substance that will not make for a healthier community. It will just cause more problems for society. I would suggest that much of the problem in the area of drugs has always been considered a police problem. We have been told it is our problem. Deal with it.
The community has to recognize that this is a community problem. We are finally starting to move forward in an integrated holistic approach. I do not think we have really given that approach the full try yet. I would like to see that that be fully tested, you know, followed through with, and re-jigged and fine-tuned before we liberalize the drug laws that are already now down to a summary conviction under 30 grams. You can tell from the statistics that I gave of 700 reported and 30 charged, that you can already read the message there, that there are not a lot of charges, and I wonder why.
The Chairman: You do not have the answer?
Mr. Clapham: I know why. I think it is a whole combination of issues. But there is no doubt the message has already been sent. It is treated as a minor problem by the courts and by society. We know that in this province, and in the Province of Alberta where I last served, that you get a bigger fine for an open bottle of beer than you do for possession of marijuana.
Senator Kenny: From my point of view it is a no-brainer: someone who steers clear of any mind-altering drug is going to be ahead of the game. I do not have any difficulty with someone who approaches from that point of view and then is consistent about cigarettes, and tobacco, and alcohol.
Having said that, a significant portion, too large a portion of the population to overlook, does not share that view. They smoke, or they drink, or they use pot. Do you really think that line should be drawn by folks such as yourself? Do you really think that it should be a criminal issue? Or would it be better addressed in another way?
Would you have us criminalize cigarettes and alcohol? That would make the line clearer.
Mr. Clapham: It is too late to go back, so I do not want to get into that issue. However, I suggest that if we move forward and open up another opportunity, another wrong, and we say it is now right, that your police services and your other services that provide the emergency and first response are going to be busier and dealing with more problems.
Senator Kenny: The police services, for example, now are not dealing with bootleggers who are running alcohol into the country. We do not have a situation that existed in North America with prohibition, and created a great deal of associated crime, and violence, and problems. I am not saying alcohol is not a problem. It is a huge problem. However, there is not the criminal aspect to it that we see with marijuana.
Mr. Clapham: We used to have a huge criminal problem with drinking and driving. Finally, when the community banded with the police and we said to our youth, ``Drinking and driving is a community problem not just a police problem,'' a new generation started to understand and accept that it is not cool to drink and drive. Although alcohol at the age of 18 or 19, depending on the province, is now legal for drinking, we have always said it was illegal to drink and drive. We are still working very hard at our preventative educational approach to deal with that. However, we are starting to change that generational thought around.
Those are residual spin-offs that we have with alcohol. I ask the question: What will we have with cannabis marijuana or other soft drugs with respect to driving and other activities?
The Chairman: I accept that. MADD, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, has been remarkable and I think we have seen a valuable change in a generation. Having said that, it was personalizing the issue and finding a way to communicate to people about the issue rather than just locking them up. Kids are respecting the law more because it makes sense to them. It is not so much that they are afraid that they can go to jail it is that they want to survive. Do you agree, or is it the threat of jail that does it?
Mr. Clapham: I think that the messages come at them from every possible angle. There is a consequence and a deterrent and it is just not something that they want to do. We are going through that right now in the area of street racing here in this city. We know that it will take a generation before we can change that attitude and that behaviour. It is not okay to take your car and race on the streets. It is not going to happen overnight. Again, we have approached this that this is a community problem, not a police problem. That is working for us.
Senator Kenny: You mentioned something to do with blurring the lines and not selling hard liquor in the same stores that sell wine and beer. What is the difference?
Mr. Clapham: I was using that as an analogy. If marijuana is legalized, then are we going to say that it is okay to use cocaine? Are we going to stop there? At hashish? Or ecstasy? What message are we sending to our children when we say, ``Now this drug is okay, but that is not''?
We are in the same dilemma we had with respect to regulations where you could not buy hard stuff in a beer and wine store. Now after all these years of some liquor being legal to purchase in certain locations, now they are starting to say, ``Well, let us start selling hard stuff,'' or ``Let us start selling it in grocery stores.'' The general consensus is ``Why not?'' because we are this far along anyways, what is the difference now? That might be asked about drugs, ``So is it okay to use heroin now and cocaine?''
Senator Kenny: In your view is marijuana a gateway to using other drugs?
Mr. Clapham: Absolutely.
Senator Kenny: It is because you have studies that show this, or it is because you have anecdotal evidence that you noticed that people who are using other drugs have used marijuana at some point?
Mr. Clapham: Mostly it is from my own personal experiences, and other experiences of police officers and policing operations in which I have been involved. I have seen, either directly or indirectly, that it is a gateway drug. But it did not start there. Most of my experiences started with tobacco and alcohol and the next incremental step was cannabis, and then to cocaine or other designer drugs.
Senator Kenny: Is it a cause, or is it just a symptom that is part of a basket of things that a kid is going through that is consistent with the young person's sexual behaviour, academic performance and so forth? Is it the cause of those things or is just a symptom that popped up when a child is troubled generally?
Mr. Clapham: Well, there are so many reasons and pressures why. There is no doubt that it could be in the basket theory that you are talking about as one of the reasons. I have seen all kinds of reasons why. I have not met anyone who just one day said, ``I am going to become a heroin addict,'' or ``I am going to get into heroin today.'' There was a start before they got to the strong, heavy, terrible addiction. I have met people who were addicted to alcohol, who have told me that they did not just one day wake up and decide they wanted to be addicted to alcohol. There was a progression.
Our position is if a line is drawn, if a stand is taken, then perhaps we can stop that progression, not completely, absolutely, but we may be able to stop some. I am paid by the City of Richmond, by the provincial government, by the federal government to protect people, to save lives, to keep the community safe. I am open to other options.
But we do not, as the police, see that the legalization right now is an option. I truly believe, and if you take some time and take a look at the Operation Green Clean in an integrated approach, we are really striving and trying hard to come up with alternative solutions because we want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.
I said at the beginning Richmond Detachment is a very progressive detachment. We recognize a paradigm shift here in the area of drugs. That is why we were willing to take the risk and move to a Green Clean approach to try to look at it and see if the prevention and the education component, to use community impact statements, to mobilize the community to say, ``Look, if this is a community problem, if we all take responsibility for this, can we make a difference?'' That is something we are trying.
Senator Carney: I would like to put on the record that I think what the City of Richmond is doing is extremely impressive. I think your coordinated approach, and the inter-agency approach is quite special. It is exciting to think that this is happening in an area with which I am familiar.
I can also see that it is very frustrating, because you have two approaches: You are currently using a precautionary approach, which is to criminalize marijuana. Then we see that there are impacts, like the increase in grow ops and crime. On the other hand, if we decriminalize, then we have adopted the risk management approach. If they are wrong, we pay a very high price. It took several generations — probably a hundred years — to get way from the idea that smoking was a popular, trendy, hip thing to do, to the fact that it kills you. These are very important issues because the proponents on both sides could be wrong and the community pays a very high price. We must take this seriously.
I believe that Richmond is 40 per cent Asian. Is there a cultural component in the enforcement you do as an RCMP officer? We blame all those ``Hong Kong drivers'' for our accidents in British Columbia, whether they come from Hong Kong, or Victoria, or whatever. Do you have specifics of whether there is a cultural component to the use of drugs, including marijuana?
Mr. Clapham: We do not have any statistics and there has been nothing earth shattering that has jumped out and suggested any cultural differences. However, in the grow operations area, there is absolutely no doubt many of them are run by organized crime. We do have both outlaw motorcycle gang involvement and other cultural gang-based groups that are all different cultures, not just one specific culture.
Senator Carney: Is it more a case of criminal activity versus non-criminal activity more than cultural?
Mr. Clapham: We really do not have any cultural statistics. I have not seen anything in the day-to-day briefings or observations.
Senator Carney: I want to ask you about the pillar approach. As a police officer, you say that the answer is to decrease demand, decrease supply, and use the pillar approach, which is awareness, prevention, education, treatment, and enforcement.
Would you rather have the budget for the pillar approach allocated entirely to enforcement, or would you have it spread between these various pillars? At the end of the day do you think spending money on awareness, or prevention, or education, or treatment is going to lead to less need to enforce?
Mr. Clapham: I can only speak on behalf of Richmond Detachment. It would be smarter to spend tax money on a pillar approach. For example, if we, as a community, thought that having police officers in the elementary schools to talk about making healthy choices and dealing with these issues even before they can legally use tobacco, I think that would be a smarter way. Perhaps then later on we would not be dealing with the problems or cleaning up the mess after serious things happen.
Senator Carney: In the Vancouver hearings we heard mixed views about this. In some cases, there was support for the pillar approach, in others there was not. I wanted to get it on the record that you support this approach.
Mr. Clapham: We have purposely avoided the area of the term ``harm reduction'' because we are not in support of the safe shooting galleries. In our pillar approach, we use the terms ``rehabilitation'' and ``treatment'' and say that works towards harm reduction. We have just stayed away from the illegal activities for harm reduction.
Senator Carney: That is an important distinction.
The Chairman: We heard about the harm principle earlier this afternoon. I do not know if you were here that long. In your brief and in some of your answers, you have talked about harm caused by an attitude, and that should be the principle on which we should build our criminal approach. The B.C. Civil Liberties Association talked about the harm principle. I think it is quite appropriate the Supreme Court is dealing with it; the harm principle will be the cornerstone of their decision. The BCCLA said that: ``No act should be criminally proscribed unless its incidence, actual or potential, is substantially damaging to society.'' Do you agree with that?
Mr. Clapham: Could you just repeat that one more time please?
The Chairman: ``No act should be criminally proscribed,'' suggesting that you should not use the penal arm of law, ``unless its incidence, actual or potential, is substantially damaging to society.''
Mr. Clapham: That would be hard for me to answer because of the ``substantially damaging to society.''
The Chairman: Let us substitute ``substantially'' for ``significantly.''
Mr. Clapham: My view of harm may be different from that of others. I see harm from all different angles that most of the community never have seen, never will see, and never do I want them to see. We purposely shelter our community because we do not want them to know the dark side. My answer to that might be very biased.
The Chairman: As a police officer you know what the proof in evidence is? You have dealt with that in your life as a police officer?
Mr. Clapham: Absolutely.
The Chairman: We are talking about damage, properly proven in evidence, significantly causing harm to society.
Mr. Clapham: It is an interesting statement. I am not prepared to go on the record saying ``yes'' or ``no,'' because I think that just, without getting the specifics. I would rather just not be quoted as saying ``yes'' or ``no'' in that area.
The Chairman: I have one final question. A 1999 RCMP report indicates that the average THC content is 7 per cent.
Mr. Clapham: 1999?
The Chairman: Yes.
Mr. Clapham: Yes.
The Chairman: Where is that 31 per cent increase coming from?
Mr. Clapham: That is what we are finding from our grow ops now.
The Chairman: I know we are going to meet with some of your experts later this week. I expect they will provide us with the proper evidence of that content?
Mr. Clapham: Yes, you will. Tonight you will have an expert on the panel.
The Chairman: Thank you very much. I will write to you.
We will now hear from Mr. Alan Randell, who is appearing as an individual.
Mr. Alan Randell: My name is Alan Randell, and this is my wife, Eleanor. Good afternoon to you, and thank you for allowing us to speak to you.
Today I want to tell you initially about our youngest son, Peter. Just before 6:30 a.m. on February 3, 1993, two police officers came to our door and informed us that Peter had died in Burnaby as a result of ingesting heroin. He fell asleep and never woke up. Half a dozen people in the apartment took the heroin, but perhaps because his body was not yet used to the drug, Peter was the only one to die. He was just 19 years old.
I want to speak a little bit about Peter, because his life did not reflect what the media thinks junkies are. He was much loved by his mom, dad, as well as his four older brothers and sisters. He had a normal upbringing with two loving parents, and he did well in school.
Ever since he was 15 Peter had strong feelings about human rights, particularly individual freedoms. One school year book described him as follows: ``Peter Randell hopes to tour with his band and bring an end to racism, intolerance and authority.'' Peter's sense of humour shows in the second sentence though: ``Peter has a personal vendetta against Bill Keane and adds, ``Family Circus must be stopped.''
Peter loved to laugh, and he made us laugh along with him. Among his favourites were The Barney Miller Show, Sam Kennison, and The Simpsons. He could recall word for word any particular scene from any show or movie he had ever watched. We did not need to rent a comedy movie, because Peter could play all the funny scenes himself. Of course, he loved his music. He was a bass player in a local band in Victoria called ``Moral Decay.'' He was a wonderful person and I would like to say a normal kid.
Why did he try heroin? He knew that heroin can kill, but he also knew that many others had enjoyed it and lived. He was a voracious reader. In the years before, little time before he died, he had read the works of many writers who not only had used heroin on a regular basis, but had survived to write about their experiences; writers such as William Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Henry Miller, and Charles Bukowski. Peter was a gifted writer himself, and he wondered if taking heroin might enhance his creative talents as it perhaps did for these writers. He also knew that heroin had been the drug of choice for many jazz musicians for 50 years. He tried it and he died. Let us try and learn from his death.
My intention today is to persuade you that in order to reduce the number of families going through the horror of losing a child to drugs, drug prohibition must be abolished.
Why do governments prohibit certain drugs? Is it to protect the users from harm? Well, no, that cannot be the reason because users suffer more — from adulterated drugs and jail time — when a drug is banned compared with when it is legally available. Of course, we became well acquainted with this aspect of government policy when we lost Peter. Besides, two of our more dangerous drugs, alcohol and tobacco, are legal.
Is it to reduce the crime associated with illegal drugs? Well, no again, that cannot be the reason, because banning a drug always gives rise to more crime — drug cartels, petty crimes by users as prohibition makes drug prices much higher, and violent disputes between dealers — than when the drug is legally available.
Is it to distract attention away from more important issues by conducting a brutal Hitler-like pogrom to ruin the lives of the innocent few who ingest or sell certain drugs? Bingo, I think that is the answer. Hitler's armies may have lost the war, but sadly, his ideas seem to have found ready acceptance all across the so-called ``civilized'' world.
I want now to focus on drugs as a human rights issue. We have a right to ingest any drug. First a quote from the eminent psychiatrist, Thomas Szasz. This is from Reason Magazine, 1978:
It is a fact that we Americans have the right to read a book — any book — not because we are stupid and want to learn from it, nor because a government-supported educational authority claims it will be good for us, but simply because we want to read it; because the government — as our servant rather than our master — hasn't the right to meddle in our private reading affairs.
I believe that we also have the right to eat, drink, or ingest a substance — any substance — not because we are sick and want it to cure us, nor because a government-sponsored medical authority claims it will be good for us, but simply because we want to take it; because the government — as our servant rather than our master — hasn't the right to meddle in our private dietary and drug affairs.
I found that pretty persuasive.
Does the state have the right to enforce any law? Are they aware of the limits? Does the Government of Canada, for instance, have the right to put into effect a law requiring the incarceration of old Jews or, as it did after Pearl Harbor, a law requiring the incarceration of Japanese-Canadians? Most people would say ``no.'' Even though, as I say, at one time they did exactly that.
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms is supposed to protect us from unjust laws, but, unfortunately, the courts have held that the Charter does not protect against insignificant or ``trivial'' limitations of rights, and has — so far in the lower courts — characterized the right to ingest marijuana as a ``trivial'' right. This ruling has been appealed to the Supreme Court but if the trivial rights argument prevails, it seems to me that government would then have the right to govern the trivial minutia of our daily lives, such as when to get up in the morning, what clothes to wear, and how often we do our laundry. Are they not trivial?
There are no trivial rights.
I should like to propose a better way to limit the power of government than to say that everyone has the right to life, liberty, and security of person as Section 7 of the Charter does because it seems clever judges are seemingly able to find all the loopholes they need in that wording.
I would like to propose that no one can be charged with a criminal offence unless that person has directly harmed or robbed another person. By harm, I do not mean actions that cause anguish and unhappiness to others, otherwise we would be imprisoning all divorcing parents, together with all kids who did not do their homework, and anyone who failed to call their mother on Mother's Day.
Choosing to ingest this or that drug is not, by this definition, a crime; it cannot be. Of course, those who support drug prohibition will say that drug use does cause physical harm to others. Yet, when you examine the evidence, it is clear that the crimes they are blaming on drugs are, in reality, a consequence of drug prohibition, i.e., murder amongst dealers, stealing to finance their drug habit, and so forth.
I believe no government has the right to punish anyone for ingesting anything, however harmful. The state is not a moral authority. There is no more reason to punish drug users and dealers today than there was in the past to hang witches, lynch blacks, or gas Jews.
I guess our forbearers were a lot smarter than we are. Some 70 years ago when they realized what a monumental disaster the prohibition of alcohol was, they ended it. Now it seems that even when faced with the overwhelming evidence of the disastrous consequences of drug prohibition, we hesitate to finish the job and end the prohibition of all drugs. The best way to reduce the harm and heartbreak of illegal drugs is to end prohibition.
The Chairman: Do you want to add something?
Ms Eleanor Randell: I have some thoughts about drug prohibition. The war on drugs is in fact the war on people. If we are worried that certain people cannot be responsible for themselves, then our state-sponsored educational system is a failure.
Pressure from the United States of America is not a good enough reason to continue with unjust laws. Being a signatory to the United Nations convention is not a good enough reason for continuing with unjust laws. Bureaucratic conservatism is not a good enough reason to continue with unjust laws.
Canada is a country founded by people seeking freedom from oppression. Let us not forget our forefathers' struggles. Peter had a poster on his bedroom wall that included the words, ``And justice for all.'' Let us make a step in the right direction. If ending the prohibition of drugs seems like a radical idea, then it is only because we have been brainwashed far too thoroughly.
Senator Carney: It is very brave of you to come forward with your family pain and your private pain to this Senate hearing.I want to say how grateful we are to you for doing that.
Ms Randell: We feel that it is very important that Peter did not die in vain. We have to be more realistic and more liberal in our approach to this whole issue so that Peter's death will have meant something.
Senator Carney: You say that one of the reasons he tried heroin is because he was a musician and because that was part of the culture of jazz musicians in the past. Do you think that he would be alive today if heroin was to be decriminalized?
Mr. Randell: Not just decriminalized, legal.
Ms Randell: Absolutely. If you could go to the grocery store and buy heroin the way you buy a bottle of Aspirin, you would not be going to the Downtown Eastside to buy. You would not go into somebody's skuzzy apartment in Burnaby to take it. When they found out he was not moving, they had to clean up the apartment so they would not criminalize themselves when the cops arrived.
He did not know that you do not have alcohol. By going downtown, you go to a pub, you have a drink of beer. Then you use the heroin. It has this effect. He did not know that. The person he was with was about twice as big a person as he was. He was also a musician and had used heroin for a number of months. We found out all this afterwards, of course. Although he had read about it, he did not have enough information. He asked me about it about six months before that, and I had my medical books out. I did not ever think he would try it; I just thought he was curious about it.
I think the other factor is in school, the police there all the time telling students how bad drugs are. I think that only makes them more curious. They tell them marijuana is really, really bad, when it does not do any harm. A person can use and try marijuana and not have any effects. So why are they going to believe the other lies?
Why are they going to believe that heroin could actually kill you? They do not know that. They are just denied information. They are not getting proper education. They are getting brainwashed.
Senator Carney: I asked the question because it was not clear from your written presentation that you thought that legalization would have saved his life.
Ms Randell: Yes, absolutely.
Mr. Randell: He would be with us today.
The Chairman: We will now hear from the Dr. Anne Vogel, Manager of the Gilwest Clinic.
Dr. Anne Vogel, Manager, Gilwest Clinic: Thank you very much for coming to Richmond with your meeting. It has not been easy for the Richmond community to understand that they, as well as many communities in British Columbia, have issues around illicit drug use. Having you come here it is very meaningful.
I am Associate Medical Health Officer in the City of Richmond, as well as a clinician. I have been a family doctor in a small town in British Columbia and for many years, I was the Deputy Medical Health Officer in the City of Vancouver. I was involved in Vancouver, the Downtown Eastside when we first brought it to the attention of the health authority and the city that we had a major epidemic occurring in that area.
I came to Richmond as medical health officer five years ago. My perspective on the issue of illegal drug use is that of health promotion and prevention perspective because that is the work I have done for many years in child health, school health, and so on. My attitude is that in dealing with the chronic condition — a chronic illness if we want to call it that — we have to look at the root causes and deal with those issues as we are dealing with the problems. We must be very supportive of the early years because most of the framework or the childhood development that enables young people to develop into healthy adults begins with positive encouragement in the early years. That has been on the table for a long time. If we are able to have young people develop with a positive self esteem, with the ability to make healthy lifestyle choices, we will be moving a long way to reducing the harmful effects of illicit drug use.
I was a member of the mayor's task force in Richmond, and I support the four-pillar approach. I have also been involved in providing service to persons with heroin addiction. That was not my intent when I came to Richmond. However, community members approached me as a medical health officer and requested that we provide some comprehensive treatment for persons with HIV in Richmond so that they would not have to travel from Richmond to St. Paul's Hospital. Our CEO at the time was supportive and worked with the community to put this together.
A consultant's report was provided about starting this service, and it included the recommendation was that we expand not just to treatment of HIV, but also to look at prevention and harm reduction surrounding HIV infection, and that this should include treatment for addiction, including methadone treatment. In 1998, we opened the HIV clinic. It had a community advisory group, and was very much supported by the community. The community named the clinic the Gilwest Clinic, because it sits on the corner of Westminster Highway and Gilbert Road in Richmond. Not very imaginative name, but it works.
To complete the treatment of the addiction treatment part, I attempted to find some clinicians in Richmond who would provide that service, because in order to have a methadone treatment program, you require a methadone licence, and there is a process to doing that. Frequently, people — professional staff — are not comfortable with dealing with addicted persons. After quite an attempt, I could not find anyone, so I decided that I would do it myself.
I got my methadone licence, and attended a school at the University of Utah in addictions medicine, and was a rookie addiction physician. It has been a learning curve ever since for me. I have enjoyed it very much because there is a lot to learn, and a lot to do. I enjoy the people I deal with. They do not make me feel uncomfortable. They all have a life story, and I like to listen to them and to help them deal with their issues.
Last spring, we started the methadone. This past fall we realized that about 70 per cent of our methadone patients also were infected with hepatitis C, so we expanded our clinic again to provide hepatitis C treatment. We have received some grants, and we have an outreach worker who is doing some prevention activities in the community around HIV and hepatitis C.
Currently in our clinic, we are seeing about 200 patients. My knowledge about the drug issue in Richmond is based on what I have learned from the 70 heroin addicts that I see on a regular basis. I have learned that while all our methadone patients are heroin addicts — some who are relatively young — they have not been addicts for a long time. Quite a number of them did not become heroin addicts until later in life. I have learned that most of them have had difficult early life experiences; many were raised in poverty with difficult backgrounds. Most of them have dealt with violence at some time or another in their life; often child abuse, and/or for the women, abuse in relationships. Most have not completed high school and had difficulties in school. Most of them have been involved with the legal system at some time, and that about 70 per cent or more have a concurrent mental health diagnosis.
I attended a meeting in Victoria on the weekend and there has been a special report on concurrent mental and addiction disorders. I think there is a realization that these two treatment streams must work more closely together. That is what I am involved with at the moment. In Richmond, we have united those programs under one administration, and we now have to get the workers to work together and so on. That is my focus at the moment.
One of the reasons for having the methadone clinic — we would like to have additional services for addiction in Richmond — is because what I learned from most of my clients is that they were originally on the Downtown Eastside, but they have come to Richmond and they do not ever want to have to go down there again. If we did not have the treatment services in Richmond, they would be going back down there and returning to their negative lifestyle. It is really important that outlying areas do provide a full range of addiction services in their communities.
As far as marijuana is concerned, it is not an issue with the people I see. Most of them have not identified it as an early problem. Alcohol is more likely. A lot of the young people said that they had trouble with alcohol and that is what started them when they were in school. That is just anecdotal. I do not have any facts to support that. Marijuana does not seem to cause a problem for any of our clients at the moment. I know we have had several patients who were addicted to heroin and were attempting to support their heroin habit by growing marijuana.
The Chairman: We have read studies on that.
Dr. Vogel: Yes, and that is just anecdotal.
The Chairman: In some studies it works combined with other diversion processes.
Dr. Vogel: Personally, I have concerns about the young people who are experimenting with marijuana. Adolescence is an age of rebellion and experimentation. Many young people have told me that they are simply experimenting. However, of concern is the connection with the criminal element. In order to obtain their illegal substance, they must connect to some illegal activity. This could be their first connection with criminal activity, and I do not think that is such a good idea.
Last year, we had a high school forum among students from all of the high schools in Richmond. It was a workshop format. They identified drugs as the number one health concern that they personally had. What that means, I do not know.
Out of that forum a group of young people came together and have formed an ongoing help team to look at issues in the school that are of concern to the young people. They are preparing another survey of students that they are going to put through the schools and so on. When I was having a discussion with them the other day, I suggested that we need to go further. When they identify drugs as a health issue, what does that mean? What are they thinking about? Are they looking at what is happening to some of their friends? Is it sort of some abstract thing out there that they think is a worry but they are not quite sure what it is all about. I am not sure, so we have to delve into that a little further.
The Chairman: If you have any research or information in that regard, feel free to contact us. We have many sources of information that we can provide.
Dr. Vogel: Yes.
The Chairman: There might be a comparison with Ontario, Quebec and what the findings that they will get. The result, of course, the drug questions can raise a lot of frightening attitudes amongst the student population, because half of the group is using illegal substance, and 90 per cent is using alcohol.
Dr. Vogel: The students are concerned.
The Chairman: They are concerned definitely.
Dr. Vogel: Since I knew I was coming to this presentation, I have done some random surveys to test what people are thinking. I have asked different groups: young people, people over 50, people in their thirties. There seems to be a lot of ambivalence about what people think about what should happen about marijuana.
I have talked to few people who are absolutely against decriminalizing marijuana. However, their concern is that if that should occur, that there must be the support, the education, everything in place to ensure that we deal with it with a focus on health promotion and prevention as we do with alcohol and tobacco. We must provide that to support the young people from going down the road to not using, but to misusing and abuse.
The Chairman: Since you are part of the discussion process here in Richmond, do you see a contradiction between crime prevention and abuse prevention?
We see a distinction between abuse prevention and crime prevention. From listening to various witnesses in Regina and here, I have sensed some confusion. Some clearly are demanding a mandate to prevent crime. We are paying people for that. Yet, health concerns and trying to prevent health consequences demands a different approach that requires different skills and people. Prevention is a big word. Do you see some kind of a contradiction in the strategy or the discussion that you are having implementing the drug strategy?
Dr. Vogel: I have not worked with the police officer who spoke today. However, I did work with his predecessor, and we had many good discussions. He attended numerous harm reduction workshops. My sense was that we had moved him along to have a better understanding about dealing with the issue of drugs.
I have had many conversations with various members of the police force. The police have been very supportive of all of the things that we have done in Richmond around prevention and harm reduction — our needle exchange and treatment.
The Chairman: We saw that in Vancouver last November. We are trying to weigh if there is a difference in approach here in Richmond compared with Vancouver. The speech is different. The discourse on this subject is different from Vancouver to Richmond.
Dr. Vogel: It seems to me, and it is a bit unfortunate, that the safe injection sites are sort of like the lightning rod and they have brought out all the worst things about people's feelings about people who inject drugs. I do not think of substance abuse as a moral issue. I like to look at it as a health issue and that it needs to be addressed that way. But that is my personal opinion, and I know that people have different views on that. It is unfortunate that the safe injection sites have taken such prominence over all the other things that we are attempting to do.
I sat on the mayor's task force. When it came to harm reduction, there was a sense that Richmond would never accept the safe injection sites. My feeling at that time was that really Richmond does not have the open drug scene that they have in the Downtown Eastside. Most of the people who are using drugs in Richmond do so behind closed doors. Most of them have some roof over their heads. We do not have the people lying about on the streets like we do downtown. From that perspective, the need for a safe injection site is not so great. We do not also have the drug overdose deaths in Richmond that they do have downtown. From my perspective, it was really not worth pushing in Richmond. It really has not been an issue.
The Chairman: But that leads to the question of openness. If you want to discuss openly a drug strategy and some people around the table are afraid of the words, then perhaps it is not a real discussion on this real strategy.
This committee is here to put on the table real facts and suggest discussion and open dialogue. Of course the moral question is here, like everywhere in the country. That is why I mention the Supreme Court. They will have to deal with that, the values on which Canada built its Charter of Rights. We will hear the answer soon. We want a debate — not only our debate and our dialogue but also all the discussion around drug strategy — to be open-minded, and people should not be afraid of using the words and looking at the problem. There are some problems, big problems.
We have come all this way and we are more and more focusing on the abuse being the real problem. For now our study is only focusing on cannabis. Next step we will do the other substances.
Dr. Vogel: Yes. There was a lot of work done with the original mayor's task force. Then our mayor left to be a minister in Victoria. Then we had a change. All the education and discussion with the first mayor was lost in a way. We started with a new mayor and a new committee, which I again joined, with new members. I had a lot of discussion with the police officer who was on that committee. I felt very positive one day after we had been meeting for some time when he said to me, ``You have completely turned around my view on how we should...'' My sense is that it is a long road. Perhaps attitudes will change one person at a time. People are beginning to understand that this is not a moral issue; it is not a criminal issue. It is about people who have a health problem that needs to be dealt with in that form. I think that is where we have to go, but I could be wrong.
Senator Carney: I wanted to ask you about in the work that you are doing in the clinic. How do you measure outcome?
Dr. Vogel: When we ask people who come to the clinic why there are here, most will reply that they are sick and tired of being sick and tired and tied to this. They have reached the point where they want to fix it. We start by doing an assessment, and we ask a lot of questions, and we do a quality of life assessment, and we do a mental health assessment, and we look at their employment, their involvement with the law, and so on.
Once we collect this information, we have to make a treatment plan and outline what we hope to achieve with them: we want to reduce their heroin problem; we want to stabilize their lives; we want to help them to get their lives enough in control so that they can get a job, and so forth.
We review the plan every few months to see how we are doing. Within our system, we have to do what we call a balance scorecard. We have indicators and we have to measure, and we have to show our success in order to keep getting our funds.
Senator Carney: Is your clientele and your caseload increasing?
Dr. Vogel: Yes. We were seeing a number of people outside of Richmond, because there are no services, or very few services in Surrey, and really none in Delta, which is our neighbour, and White Rock. Because we are overloaded with the resources we have, we are now going to have to say we are only going to take people from Richmond.
Senator Carney: You say that there are about 200 clients?
Dr. Vogel: Yes. Some of those are our HIV and hepatitis C; about 70 are methadone. For our methadone program, we have one evening and one morning a week. That is all the time that we have.
Senator Carney: Can you say from your work that these 70 people are less involved in criminal activities to support their heroin?
Dr. Vogel: Yes. They are less involved. About 50 per cent are employed. We have many who are not using at all since they have been on the methadone program — probably 80 per cent are not using heroin.
Senator Carney: People talk a lot about the cost of heroin addicts in terms of the community and the health costs to them and the crime costs to the community. Do you know what it costs to keep someone on methadone?
Dr. Vogel: It is not very much at all. The cost of methadone itself is minimal. There is a cost for the drug prescribing and the program. I think that might be about $100 a month, which goes to the pharmacy that dispenses the methadone.
Senator Carney: That is the pharmacy costs.
Dr. Vogel: Pharmacy cost, yes.
Senator Carney: So this is not an elaborately expensive program.
Dr. Vogel: No. If a person is on welfare, social assistance, that cost is covered. Otherwise, they have to pay the drugstore themselves. The costs for our program include the physician, and the nurse, and the social worker, and so on, for that many hours a week. It is not very much.
Senator Carney: You say from the people you deal with marijuana was not much of a trigger.
Dr. Vogel: They have not identified that. They will identify that they have been an occasional user.
Senator Carney: I just wanted to double check: You said alcohol abuse was more likely.
Dr. Vogel: That is more likely, yes.
Senator Carney: You have been a medical health officer in both jurisdictions. What is the difference between the ways the issue is treated in Richmond vis-à-vis Vancouver? Is Richmond, in your experience, more progressive than Vancouver?
Dr. Vogel: No, I do not think so.
Senator Carney: If you are going to take a community as a model to use for other communities elsewhere, would Richmond be a good place to start?
Dr. Vogel: Yes. I think we are being looked at because we have this sort of integration, and we have this multi- discipline team. We are being seen as a bit of a pilot. People have come from different towns in the province to look at what we are doing, and we are quite proud of that. We had people from Prince George here today. I think someone from Campbell River and Powell River is coming. We are quite pleased with that.
The Chairman: Thank you.
We will now hear from Anna Marie White, a policy analyst with Focus on the Family.
Ms Anna Marie White, Policy Analyst, Focus on the Family: Senators, our organization responds to the concerns of Canadian families: both the struggles that parents face in raising their children and the difficulties that young people must surmount while growing up. To this end, we publish monthly magazines which go to over 100,000 Canadian families, distribute thousands of books and publications, air a daily radio broadcast on 140 stations in Canada, run parent-teen conferences, and operate a national response centre where we hear from literally hundreds of Canadian families every day seeking information and counselling on numerous family issues.
We also coordinate a drug education and early intervention program called, ``How To Drug Proof Your Kids.'' The goal of the program is to enable parents to better empower their children to resist using psychoactive substances. We believe healthy relationships and parental involvement are key in helping children and young people make wise choices regarding drug use.
Our concerns with this committee's discussion paper focus primarily on cannabis policies and the resulting effects on youth and families. This presentation will contain several recommendations which we trust will be of assistance to the committee when forming its final report to government.
As alluded to in the discussion paper, the medical evidence regarding the health effects of cannabis — both detrimental and beneficial — are inconclusive, and at best, contradictory. I am certain that you have heard much evidence from both sides of the marijuana debate. Nonetheless, we would like to briefly draw your attention to research concerning the adverse health effects of smoking marijuana.
As the medical effects of marijuana is not our area of specific expertise, we will refer you to the excellent work done by Physicians for a Smoke Free Canada, who expressed their concern with medical marijuana in January of this year by saying, ``At this point we know more about the harm caused by marijuana smoke than we do about the benefits.'' Their position paper, ``Marijuana as Medicine,'' contains a detailed compendium of research related to the harmful effects of smoking marijuana, and points to the better practice of administering treatment through dronabinol and nabilone for medical treatment. I believe this paper should be attached to the back of your notes as well, if you would like to consult it for future reference.
With regards to the discussion paper, we would like to address several conclusions reached by the committee. The discussion paper mentions that public policy seems to have little effect on patterns of usage. What public policy does influence, as we all know, is the allocation of resources. It is the allotment of financial resources, as it pertains to drug policy strategies, that will determine outcome behaviour.
Our first recommendation is non-use as the highest goal. One of the key findings listed in the discussion paper states that ``Cannabis is a psycho-active substance and it is therefore better to not use it.'' We agree wholeheartedly with this statement and suggest that it form the basis for a strategy to reduce the use of cannabis in Canada. Also, on the basis of this statement, we would advocate an approach that focuses not only on reducing addictive behaviour or the abuse of cannabis, but also strategies to reduce overall prevalence rates of cannabis use in Canada. Since you have determined already that it is better not to use cannabis at all, let us then set that as our goal and work towards accomplishing it.
Our second recommendation is to focus on prevention. We suggest to the committee that rather than focusing on reforming our drug laws, efforts would be much better spent on examining strategies focused on prevention. Canada's Drug Strategy points out that first and foremost prevention is the most successful and most cost-effective intervention. Since we know that to be true, should we not focus our attention on tactics that will ensure the greatest possible results and return on our investment?
Prevention efforts must address why marijuana is growing in popularity among young people. It is affordable. It is available. Increasingly, it is more socially acceptable. Marijuana can be purchased just about anywhere in Canada, and is well within the reach of the disposable income of an average teenager. Pop culture and media send messages to young people that getting high is part of having fun and partying.
Kids do drugs for many reasons: to fit in with their friends, because it is fun, for the thrill of doing something perceived as bad, and sometimes to escape from the reality of everyday living. While we cannot eliminate the negative influence of peers, we can mitigate its effects by enabling young people to opt out of using drugs and instead make wise choices that show respect for their health and bodies — responsible decisions that will lead to greater success in life.
Part of this prevention message must acknowledge that one of the root causes of drug use is founded in a lack of information regarding the adverse effects of drugs, not only marijuana and other illicit narcotics, but also licit drugs such as alcohol and tobacco. Messaging from the media and government should promote a healthy lifestyle that is drug-free, as this will give young people the greatest opportunities for success in education, employment, relationships, and attaining personal life goals.
Cannabis use, as well as other psychotropic drug use, is often symptomatic of the disconnectedness felt by many young people, particularly through the turbulent adolescent years. As I mentioned, our organization's program, ``How To Drug Proof Your Kids'' seeks to prevent drug use through close parent-child relationships. It is, in essence, a parenting course wrapped up in a drug prevention program. Well-functioning families led by a parenting style that is involved and invested in children's lives, are one of the best defences against drug use.
In a compendium of best practices prepared by the Canadian Centre On Substance Abuse, the authors draw attention to the importance of parental influence in high-risk behaviour among youth:
... they, of course have a crucial part to play in preventing substance use problems through their role as parents. Parental monitoring of children's behaviour and strong parent-child relationships are also positively correlated with decreased drug use among students.
Numerous studies completed at the Center on Addictions and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, which have included extensive research into prevention programs, have reached the same conclusion. I would be happy to provide you with some of those studies, if you would like me to follow up on that.
Our third recommendation is to provide leadership for the nation. We urge the committee to consider the importance of articulating an agreement between the various levels of government, as well as its citizens, that will create, to the best of our ability, a country that is drug-free. The 2001 Report of the Auditor General confirmed what Canada is and has been lacking:
Canada requires stronger leadership and more consistent co-ordination to set a strategy, common objectives, and collective performance expectations ... The present structure for leadership and for co-ordination of federal efforts needs to be reviewed and improved. The mechanisms for co-ordination with the provinces and municipalities also need review since they cross three levels of government.
We would add to that statement the need to network and cooperate with non-governmental organizations, such as Focus on the Family, that seek common goals regarding a reduction in the use of cannabis. Given not only the ideological but geographic challenges faced in a country as vast as Canada, this call for stronger leadership becomes even more imperative.
Our fourth recommendation: Respect the rule of law through adherence to it. Another key finding of the discussion paper points to a concern for the rule of law. I quote from the paper, ``Over 1 Canadian in 10 and 30% to 50% of youth aged 15-24 have used cannabis in the last year despite its illegality; this may cause greater disrespect for the rule of law.'' Certainly, our organization would agree that respect for the rule of law is of utmost concern for maintaining order in any free and democratic society. However, we come to a different conclusion regarding how respect for law is preserved. Abolishing a law on the basis that it is being ignored by 1 in 10 Canadians will certainly be a catalyst for dismantling a structured and ordered legal system. The best way to promote respect for the rule of law is to encourage citizens to abide by it.
As members of a society, we must remember that it is structured and ordered by government for the good of all who inhabit it. Within that context, certain restrictions on personal liberty are justified. When seat belt legislation first appeared on the Canadian public policy scene in the late 1970s, it was greeted cheerfully by the 10 per cent of us who were already fans of passenger restraints, and a mixture of disdain and contempt by much of the remaining 90 per cent of population.
Yet, now, 20 years later few could refute the contribution seatbelt use has made in saving lives. Despite having twice as many cars on the roads, we have fewer than half the number of injuries due in large part to legislation and enforcement in two major areas: Seatbelt use and apropos to the current debate, driving while impaired. Rigorous education campaigns informed drivers about the need for passenger restraint and now, two decades later, seatbelt use is above 90 per cent in almost every province.
Citizens look to government for leadership that will produce benefits, not only for individual citizens, but also for the society as a whole. The formation of public opinion can be affected greatly by the information and education strategies in place to clarify the intended benefits of legislative policies. In this case, our marijuana laws serve to protect Canadians from something that we know to be disadvantageous.
As the efficacy of current law enforcement strategies is now the subject of heated debate, we will leave that discussion for the Canadian Police Association, the RCMP, the Canadian Chiefs of Police, and other relevant enforcement agencies. We would like to state our support and endorsement for efforts to maintain and strengthen drug laws in Canada. We also encourage the committee to critically analyze the ability of law enforcement agencies and legal bodies to uphold the rule of law under current legislation.
Our fifth recommendation is to safeguard messages to our youth. We recommend caution in advocating the decriminalization of marijuana. Lessening the severity of circumstances for the possession of marijuana lessens the deterrent effect for young people who perceive such a shift in policy as approval, and even encouragement to use marijuana. Research shows that young people are responsive to the perceived harm of using narcotics, much like adults. If a clear message is given that marijuana causes direct physical harm — which we know it does through pulmonary damage and other detrimental health effects — then young people can make informed decisions regarding marijuana use.
Some marijuana advocates have suggested that marijuana be regulated and taxed as a revenue-generating source for governments. Regulation, while it may sound appealing because it implies some consistency or guarantee of quality, poses insurmountable difficulties. In British Columbia alone there are an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 grow ops in private dwellings, and this number varies from 10,000 to 25,000 depending on whom you speak with. However, we know that there are more than we can handle. The current policing resources have been insufficient to eliminate those.
Given the difficulty in preventing these entrepreneurs from doing something that is now completely illegal, you can imagine the difficulties of implementing regulatory policy that will allow them to continue growing marijuana, but also pay the government to do so. If it appears that the Canadian Customs and Revenue Agency is more successful at enforcing law than our own police forces, perhaps we should be examining how we can better enable law enforcement officers to perform this task within the framework of current drug laws.
Our sixth recommendation: To invest in long-term approaches. We urge the committee to have a long-term vision regarding the effects of reforming drug policy in Canada. A short history lesson: During the formation of Canada's first drug laws, the 1909 Opium Act, as well as the 1911 Opium and Other Drugs Act, tobacco was thoughtlessly disregarded as non-addictive. Today, nearly a century later, with the dearth of information available to us regarding tobacco research, we understand clearly that we are paying for the lack of foresight on the part of our policy-makers at that time.
Both federal and provincial governments are now actively campaigning against tobacco use through high tax rates, graphic photo campaigns, and aggressive anti-tobacco programs. Tobacco kills one in five Canadians and is the number one preventable cause of all deaths in this country. Provincial governments are suing tobacco companies for the health care costs of people who become ill due to smoking. Medical doctors in the Prairie provinces are refusing to treat patients who will not quit smoking. Tobacco costs the country over $10 billion per year due to health care expenses, lost productivity, and premature deaths.
Our seventh recommendation is to guard against adverse trends in drug policy. We are also concerned about the direction in which drug policy reform has been moving. An article published last summer in The Economist magazine makes the following recommendation:
The best answer is to move slowly but firmly to dismantle the edifice of enforcement. Start with the possession of cannabis and amphetamines, and experiment with different strategies... Move onto hard drugs, sold through licensed outlets...
This position has been adopted by several organizations in Canada, which this committee has already heard from, which are actively advocating the decriminalization and eventual legalization of not only marijuana, but also other currently illicit narcotics such as heroin and cocaine.
Much rhetoric exists around the supposed ``war on drugs'': Have we lost the war, what do we do now, and were we really fighting a war in the first place? The challenge presented to this committee is not an easy task: To recommend workable feasible policies regarding cannabis use. To this end, we trust that the committee will be prudent in its decisions, innovative in its policy recommendations, and resistant to the urge to simply give sway to ``hemp mania.'' We owe it to our young people.
In conclusion, I would like to briefly review our recommendations. First, let us set the non-use of cannabis as our highest goal. Second, we need to focus on prevention as that has been proven to be the healthiest, most cost effective means of discouraging drug use. Third, we encourage the federal government to provide coordinated leadership for multi-governmental multi-sectoral campaigns to reduce drug use in Canada. Fourth, we want to promote respect for the rule of law by following the law. Remember that well over the majority of Canadians have not broken our cannabis laws. Fifth, we must ensure the messages we send to youth are clear: Drug use is harmful, and not using drugs is the best lifestyle option. Sixth, we recommend that committee and government invest in options that will address cannabis use in a framework for long-term success. Finally, we must guard against capitulating to pressure to accept drug policies that will allow for further erosion of our drug policy framework.
Again, I thank the committee for the opportunity to speak on behalf of our organization and the thousands of Canadian families that we represent. We look forward to hearing the committee's final report on cannabis use later this summer.
The Chairman: On the negative health effect you decided to choose Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada. Why not choose the Lancet report?
Ms White: There are a lot of reports. I simply chose a small selection.
The Chairman: You are aware of the Lancet report?
Ms White: Which report? What was the date?
The Chairman: It is 1998. They review the negative or physiological effects of cannabis, and they came to the conclusion that there is relatively no harm.
Ms White: I was trying to stick with research coming out of Canada. I understand there is a lot going on in the U.K. and as well at other international countries. However, given this is a Canadian committee, we are dealing with Canadian policy, I would like to stick with what has been produced by Canadian doctors. I understand there is great contention, shall we say, amongst the various researchers.
The Chairman: On the health effect there is no big contention. You can see in our document that we went through all the documents, not only Canadian, but also from abroad. What you have in our discussion paper is quite good for status on the knowledge.
You referred to drug education and early prevention. Do you have programs that have been evaluated?
Ms White: Yes. We have adapted our program from an organization in Australia that has now run this with 20,000 parents. They have implemented a five-year longitudinal study that will follow up on the success of this program as well. It is structured so that parents will be informed and able to speak to their kids about the pressures they face with peer pressure, with drugs being available on the streets, at bus stations. Our goal, as you will see from our brief, is to attain the highest level of health and potential.
There are very few of us here that would disagree that drug use — be it alcohol, tobacco, illicit drugs — does impair our performance abilities. Few of us that can afford to operate at less than 100 per cent of our capacity and still succeed to the goals that we could otherwise. That is the highest goal.
The Chairman: If we are talking about prevention and education, and offering the best knowledge to inform the population to make the best choices, is it not at the end their choice?
Ms White: Yes, absolutely. I think that the importance of making good choices relies on good information. So we want to ensure that parents — as well as kids, youths and teenagers — are well-informed of the effects or the potential effects of what may happen regardless of what the drug may be: Tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, LSD, ecstasy. The list goes on and on. It is not simply relegated to one narcotic.
Senator Carney: Have you filed with the committee something about the Focus On The Family Association? Like, you know, are you an NGO? How many members? Are you national? Are you incorporated in British Columbia? Is there any information on your group?
Ms White: I am happy to provide that. We are a national NGO. Roughly 130,000 families subscribe to our newsletters. We have been in existence in Canada for I believe 18 years now. We operate from coast to coast. We are on 140 radio stations. We are quite extensively involved. We have representatives and people who work on our behalf in our program implementation from the East Coast to the West Coast. We are very much a national organization.
Senator Carney: Good. The committee needs that information. Otherwise, you could be anyone with a post office box.
Ms White: I understand. Certainly. I would be happy to provide that.
Senator Carney: Where do you get your funding? Are you government funded at all?
Ms White: No. We receive no government funding. We receive funding from people who support us. We are a non- profit organization.
Senator Carney: So you are not part of a health system?
Ms White: No, not at all. In fact, health is really only one aspect of what we think contributes to family well being.
Senator Carney: I think it is important to support your brief with some information about your association. I do not know whether you are a medical physician or executive director of this, but anything that we can have to throw light on your background would be helpful.
Ms White: Certainly. I will provide that in writing to you.
The Chairman: Thank you very much.
The committee adjourned.