I oppose Tasmanian trials for medical cannabis and I oppose special, Tasmanian legislation to legalise its. My opposition has nothing to do with opposing pain relief or fearing the spread of illicit drugs but everything to do with removing duplication of effort. I actually support legalisation of medical cannabis, but what I don’t support is the waste of time and effort in producing unique to Tasmania legislation and then conduct unique to Tasmania trials, when the issues facing us are no different to those facing NSW and Victoria, both of whom are further ahead both preparing legislation and approving trials. This week both NSW and Victoria approved trials, which they are in a much better position to resource from their much larger primary industry and health departments. Even the Prime Minister seems to have come on board.

But its worse than that, after the trials have finished and presumably, unique to Tasmania regulation and controls have been put into place, we will need to have a special group of new public servants to monitor compliance and accredit Tasmanian medical cannabis suppliers. This will result in a higher cost to Tasmanian patients, as suppliers will have to factor in the cost to meet the unnecessary, unique to Tasmania rules.

So here is my idea . Scrap the legislative council committee (I bet half their submissions are the same as those provided to their equivalent NSW/Vic committees anyway), scrap the trials, scrap trying to come up with our own legislation, wait until NSW and Victoria have finished their trials and legislation, then copy the legislation and use it here. With all three governments from the same political party, what they come up with probably won’t be that different, anyway. As far as which products and suppliers are acceptable in Tasmania, if its good enough for NSW or Victoria, just say its good enough here.

Alternatively, in a Utopian world, perhaps all three trials could be replaced with a single National trial conducted under the auspices of COAG. Now there’s a thought. Just think of money, political argument and public servant time that might all save!
Hans Willink. Candidate for Deputy Mayor of Clarence. Responsibility for election comment is taken by Hans Willink, 799 Acton Road Acton Park