Wynne wants pot restricted to LCBO

Ensuring recreational marijuana sales are restricted to the LCBO is a key priority for Ontario as the legalization of weed looms, says Premier Kathleen Wynne.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday at Queen’s Park, Wynne lamented that “we’re in a grey area right now,” which has enabled more than 100 illegal weed stores to open in Toronto in recent weeks.

“We literally don’t have that legal framework from the federal government. I feel very strongly that there needs to be control and regulation of marijuana,” said the premier, who added that it is up to the city to tackle the “dispensaries.”

“In the interim, I have to say to you that it really . . . does fall to the municipalities and their bylaws,” she said.

As first revealed by the Star on Saturday, the province has begun preparing for legalized marijuana sales by striking a working group of bureaucrats from the ministries of finance, health and the attorney general. That task force is looking at how to limit recreational marijuana retailing to the government’s 650-outlet Liquor Control Board of Ontario, which has a monopoly on the sale of spirits in the province.

“We have the LCBO in place (and) I think that we’ve demonstrated that that kind of regulation is efficient and is effective,” Wynne said.

“And I will certainly be advocating with the federal government that we have that kind of regulation in place.”

Despite a recent crackdown by Toronto police, scores of illegal “dispensaries” are openly operating on major thoroughfares.

Medicinal marijuana is already legal, but only with a prescription from a medical doctor and supplied by one of 31 federally licensed producers who must ship the Health Canadainspected cannabis via registered mail.