Long Time Coming

Today should be a celebration across Canada as Cannabis becomes legal and relief from criminal records for simple possession are in the works.

Instead here in Dartmouth the parsimonious tut-tutters of Halifax Council are working to ruin the joy. By passing a non-smoking bylaw of draconian breadth they have armed the police with a sure-fire method of harassing anyone they please.

The guise of public health is used to justify a bad law. If the council was really interested in our health they would have moved years ago to convert the cities vehicles and buses to electricity. Instead, their real purpose is to make illegal what Parliament has just made legal. Tobacco smokers are just the victims here of overzealous councillors who came to realize they had to ban tobacco or their flimsy legal foundation was doomed.

I don’t smoke tobacco and have no intention of smoking cannabis, but this law is wrong. Today saw long lines of people waiting to buy Cannabis, and I hope someone sues to have this law struck down.

Those of us that have lobbied for years to make Cannabis legal should neither support nor vote for any member of this City Council.