Provinces split on how to sell cannabis
Western regions may pass sales off to private retailers to try to thwart black market
MONTREAL— A national split is emerging on marijuana legalization that pits Ontario and eastern provinces opting for total control over pot sales against private retail regimes emerging in the West.
The regional divide reflects a clash of opinions about whether it is more important to put black-market pot producers out of business or heed public-health warnings when access to the drug becomes legal on July 1, 2018.
So far, only three Canadian provinces have spelled out their approach to the sale of marijuana. Both Ontario and New Brunswick have opted to control access to cannabis through retail stores that will be operated by the provincial liquor boards.
Ontario plans to launch 40 stores in time for next summer that will be run by a subsidiary of the Liquor Control Board of Ontario. The plan calls for 150 stores by 2020.
New Brunswick has unveiled an even tougher plan to have a maximum of 20 government-run pot stores in 15 communities. Identification will be checked at the entrance, there will be no advertising or window displays and the product will be kept in locked glass cases.
But Manitoba came out this week in contrast to its eastern counterparts and other western provinces look poised to follow suit.
Premier Brian Pallister said Manitoba’s liquor board will distribute legal marijuana to private retailers, who will have freedom to market the product, with certain restrictions, and set competitive prices. Bids on retail licences are being accepted through to Dec. 22.
“It will help achieve our goal of eliminating the black market which has controlled the cannabis trade for a very long time,” Pallister said of the private sales model.
The emerging plans pit a “Prohibition-era mentality” in Eastern Canada against a free-market view that reigns in the West, said Andrew Klukas, president of the Western Convenience Store Association, which represents 7,000 retail outlets in the four western provinces as well as Yukon, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories.
New Brunswick’s cannabis legislation, for example, requires pot smokers to keep their stash in a locked container or room in their home to prevent minors from getting at it. Ontario will ban people from smok- ing anywhere but their private residences.
“Out here in the West, we’re being a bit more pragmatic and looking at it from the perspective of tomorrow and what the world’s going to look like,” Klukas said. “The stigma is not going to exist in the future.”
British Columbia has expressed openness to having a mix of private stores, as the city of Vancouver has specifically requested, and government-run outlets in other parts of the province. In Saskatchewan, deputy premier Don Morgan said of Ontario’s plan: “I suspect we would probably be looking at other options,” according to the CBC.
Alberta’s NDP government noted in an October framework document that the Ontario model allows for oversight and control, while private retailers may be more effective at choking off the black-market supply.
But it’s not yet clear what direction Quebec will take. A government spokesperson refused to comment, saying legislation would be tabled “very soon.” But reports suggest that the distribution and sale of pot will be overseen by the Société des alcools du Québec, the provincial liquor board.
But Alain Bouchard, head of Quebec’s Couche-Tard convenience store chain, wants in, having hired lobbyists to make the company’s case to the provincial government.