Ontario, let the pot shops thrive

Life in isolation over the past four months or so has generally been, to channel Thomas Hobbes, “solitary, poor, nasty (and) brutish.” But amidst all the lockdowns, travel restrictions and emergency orders, there have been some positive policy changes, such as provincial governments allowing Canadians to get cocktails delivered to their doors.

Given that the sky hasn’t fallen as a result of such policies, we had hoped that while governments reopen their economies, they would realize that some of the liberties given to individuals and businesses as emergency measures should never have been restricted in the first place. Alas, that appears to have been too much to ask.

This week, Ontario announced that it was extending many of its emergency orders until July 22. Not included in the list of extensions, however, was the order that allowed private cannabis retailers to offer online sales and curbside pickup.

Retailers are angry because they think they’ll lose business from customers who felt safer purchasing cannabis this way during the pandemic, or simply enjoyed the convenience of being able to order online. And they’re probably right. There’s also the fact that dispensaries scrambled to add e-commerce functionality to their websites and contract with private couriers when the order came down in April, which surely wasn’t cost-free.

So why not allow legal businesses to continue selling a legal product by mail order, as they do in some other provinces? What societal harm was worth overlooking at the height of the pandemic but must be addressed now?

A spokeswoman for Ontario’s Ministry of Finance told The Canadian Press that delivery and curbside pickup “supported cannabis retailers during an unprecedented economic downturn and ensured consumers could access legal and safe recreational cannabis while adhering to public health guidance during the pandemic.”

She did not offer a reason for why this won’t be true next week. Because there is none.

There’s no reason that private delivery services cannot be trusted to check IDs at the door. We know this because the Ontario Cannabis Store (OCS), the government’s online pot shop, which, until April was the only way to buy mail-order cannabis in the province, uses one for its same-day and express delivery services. And private retailers have been doing this since April.

It’s clear that the only reason the government is not continuing to allow private stores to continue online sales is because it wants to preserve the OCS’s monopoly. But why should the government be a drug dealer in the first place?

Especially now, governments should be doing everything they can to help businesses stay afloat — especially when it won’t cost taxpayers a dime. A government that came into office promising to scrap the Ontario Liberal’s government-controlled cannabis retail system in favour of a free market one should understand this better than most.