Cannabis - Time for a re-think?

[Barlow]

Not much is going to change when there is an increase of people driving on our roads impaired through cannabis use.

link

Police reported that the vehicle was swerving in the road and slowing down so they stopped Higgins on Belmont Hill.

Officers described the 18-year-old as having bloodshot eyes, being lethargic, and slurring his speech.

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After being taken to police headquarters, a blood sample was taken which later produced a reading of 3.9. The legal limit for cannabis is two

 

 

Edited April 14, 2023 by Barlow

[Declan]

Has there been an increase in drug drivers or an increase in those detected as drunk driving?

[Barlow]

1 hour ago, Declan said:

Has there been an increase in drug drivers or an increase in those detected as drunk driving?

It's an interesting question. I rather think there has been an increase in druggie drivers.

I know there aren't many people calling for the legal drink driving limit to be raised

Edited April 14, 2023 by Barlow
drunk drink stoned lowered raised smashed drive

[Declan]

Didn't they recently introduce a new easily to administer test? 

[thommo2010]

13 minutes ago, Declan said:

Didn't they recently introduce a new easily to administer test? 

January 2022 new legislation came out and a test that can be done at the roadside, neither of which had ever been in the iom before. So there's probably the same amount of people driving under the influence but now there's tests and legislation. Prior it was simply down to a Doctor to give an opinion if someone was fit or not

[Ativa]

1 hour ago, Barlow said:

It's an interesting question. I rather think there has been an increase in druggie drivers.

I know there aren't many people calling for the legal drink driving limit to be raised

I would be amazed if there are more drug drivers now than five years ago.

Its significantly harder to get hold of these days, and I also know several people who now only partake if they are not driving for a few days (which is stupid, because for years they have driven with no issues)

[cissolt]

1 hour ago, Ativa said:

I would be amazed if there are more drug drivers now than five years ago.

Its significantly harder to get hold of these days, and I also know several people who now only partake if they are not driving for a few days (which is stupid, because for years they have driven with no issues)

The volume of drivers is probably the same but the police policy to test anyone with the flimsiest of excuses is the cause for the rise. In the paper this week it was an insurance check on a car being driven normally, zero impairment.

[John Wright]

Until late January last year there was no specific legislation with a prescribed drug limit. The new legislation was subject to a defective appointed day order and everyone who was “drug wiped” with roadside testing for the first few weeks had to be let go.

Then a  new corrected appointed day order came in and since then anyone drug wiped and positive has had to give a blood sample. They are taking approx 4 months to analyse. Then charge time and wait for court. Another week to a month. 

The first prosecutions and convictions were in August 2022. So, whatever we are seeing now can only be compared with figures since then. The over prescribed limit didn’t exist before.

On 4/14/2023 at 11:15 AM, Declan said:

Has there been an increase in drug drivers or an increase in those detected as drunk driving?

 

23 hours ago, Barlow said:

It's an interesting question. I rather think there has been an increase in druggie drivers.

I know there aren't many people calling for the legal drink driving limit to be raised

 

23 hours ago, Declan said:

Didn't they recently introduce a new easily to administer test? 

 

23 hours ago, thommo2010 said:

January 2022 new legislation came out and a test that can be done at the roadside, neither of which had ever been in the iom before. So there's probably the same amount of people driving under the influence but now there's tests and legislation. Prior it was simply down to a Doctor to give an opinion if someone was fit or not

 

21 hours ago, Ativa said:

I would be amazed if there are more drug drivers now than five years ago.

Its significantly harder to get hold of these days, and I also know several people who now only partake if they are not driving for a few days (which is stupid, because for years they have driven with no issues)

 

20 hours ago, cissolt said:

The volume of drivers is probably the same but the police policy to test anyone with the flimsiest of excuses is the cause for the rise. In the paper this week it was an insurance check on a car being driven normally, zero impairment.

 

[cissolt]

It feels like it's being misused by the police.  Does the law state impaired driving through drugs? Or drugs in system and impairment isn't an issue?

[offshoremanxman]

1 hour ago, cissolt said:

It feels like it's being misused by the police.  Does the law state impaired driving through drugs? Or drugs in system and impairment isn't an issue?

It is certainly being misused by the police. But equally it probably shows the actual scale of recreational drug use in the IOM if so many are being caught. The best possible way forward is de-criminalization as all that’s going to happen, as the cops can’t help it here, is that those swabbed who test positive will just have an eye kept in them with a view to being caught in possession at some stage. They won’t be able to help themselves once these people pop up on the radar as proven drug users. 

[John Wright]

4 hours ago, cissolt said:

It feels like it's being misused by the police.  Does the law state impaired driving through drugs? Or drugs in system and impairment isn't an issue?

It’s like drink driving. There is a limit above which it’s illegal to drive. Above the limit you’re automatically, legally impaired.

[The Phantom]

Now Germany.  From today's Times.

the country is now preparing to conduct Europe’s largest experiment in creating a legalised cannabis market, stretching all the way from farm to spliff.

Ministers say that by the end of this year, Germans over the age of 18 should be permitted to grow up to three cannabis plants each and possess up to 25g (0.9oz) of the drug for personal consumption, as opposed to present punishments that theoretically include fines of €500 for first-time offenders or up to five years in prison for particularly serious cases.

The most significant measure, though, is a plan to sanction non-profit “cannabis clubs” that will farm the drug and distribute as much as 50g a month to each of their fee-paying members.

The precise details will be formulated in the autumn but the basics are already clear. Over five years a set of “model regions”, which may include the city states of Berlin and Bremen, will study the effects, carrying out regular quality tests and ensuring that the clubs refrain from advertising and appoint officers to monitor addiction and keep the drug away from children.

Some of Germany’s more zealous liberal politicians hope this will be the first step towards a wholesale deregulation of illegal drugs.

The government, however, is much more cautious and with good reason. The scheme is fraught with difficulties. European Union law obliges member states to ban the cultivation, sale and consumption of cannabis.

Five years ago, Luxemburg was forced to retract similar plans under pressure from Brussels. This month Germany was compelled to water down its original proposals, which had envisaged licensed premises selling cannabis across the country. How the EU will view the legality of the proposed German experiment remains to be seen.

Yet in practice a number of EU states have identified certain loopholes. In the Netherlands, about a third of municipalities have tolerated the distribution of cannabis through several hundred “coffee shops” since the 1970s, although production remains illegal and the supply chain is dominated by criminal gangs.

The “cannabis club” concept is borrowed from Spain, where about 500 small associations grow small quantities for their members, and Malta, which recently permitted the formation of clubs with up to 500 members. Several other states have decriminalised the possession of minor amounts.

Nowhere, however, has the idea been tested on such a grand scale as Germany is contemplating. Schröder, 31, one of the reform’s most enthusiastic proponents, argues that it could ultimately serve as a template for the rest of Europe to follow.

“If we do a good job of achieving the goals we’ve set ourselves, and I’m optimistic on that score, then I think it would be an appropriate model for other countries,” she said. “We ourselves have learnt from the experiences in other countries, such as the Netherlands or Portugal. Now we can ensure that we do some things better from the start.

“So I think this question of relieving the burden on police, protecting young people, better supporting addicts, isn’t some typically German phenomenon. The situation is similar in a lot of countries. For that reason I’d be delighted if other countries follow this path, assuming we get it right.”

It is a remarkably bold leap for a country that usually has a reputation as a bastion of small-c conservatism with a suspicion of sudden change.

Less than a decade ago, polls showed two thirds of Germans opposed legalisation and less than a third were in favour. Now the balance of public opinion tilts in almost precisely the opposite direction, as the coalition government under Olaf Scholz embarks on an ambitious programme of broader socially liberal reforms, from gender self-identification to looser naturalisation rules.

 “We have a lot of social debates that have already been going for a long time and they weren’t able to break through for 16 years [under the previous government],” Schröder said. “So they’re picking up speed a bit now that there is a progressive majority in the Bundestag. And I think an attitude of live and let live has already taken root in many parts of Germany.”

The arguments in favour of legalisation range from appeals to individual liberty and tax revenues to the case that it would free up police resources for more serious crimes and shift the emphasis from punishing drug abuse to preventing it.

Last year alone, the German authorities had to deal with 175,000 cannabis-related offences. The health ministry estimates that 4.5 million adults took cannabis at least once in the past 12 months. As a percentage of the population this is roughly the same as in the UK and Ireland, but behind France, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands.

Some of the objections to the reform, especially in Germany’s conservative-leaning states, are ideological. Others are more practical. Bavaria and Denmark have warned that their citizens could be sucked into the pilot cultivation zones by “weed tourism” across state lines.

Critics also suggest that the legal cannabis will end up being more expensive than black-market products if it is taxed, or that the measures will do nothing to combat the illegal trade outside the model regions.

For some members on the more liberal end of Schröder’s FDP, the measures do not go far enough. At the party conference two years ago its youth wing embarrassed the leadership by winning a vote in favour of a loosely-worded motion calling for the decriminalisation of all illegal drugs according to the Portuguese model. The result was swiftly overturned on the basis that no one really understood what the “Portuguese model” meant.

Yet some in the party still cherish hopes that the cannabis plan will be only the beginning. “The legalisation of cannabis should be scientifically monitored so we can learn from this process,” Franziska Brandmann, leader of the FDP’s Young Liberals faction, told a local newspaper this month. “And even beyond cannabis we should ask ourselves: is our approach to drugs really working?”

 

[The Phantom]

On 4/22/2023 at 3:59 PM, John Wright said:

It’s like drink driving. There is a limit above which it’s illegal to drive. Above the limit you’re automatically, legally impaired.

Except with Alcohol, they actually did some research to come up with figures regarding impairment to driving. 

Here they literally just made up a figure that was actually contrary to what was advised. 

Also people who have had a single standard drink are generally not over the limit and certainly won't be for days afterwards, contrary to the current situation with our Drug Driving. 

[John Wright]

2 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

Except with Alcohol, they actually did some research to come up with figures regarding impairment to driving. 

Here they literally just made up a figure that was actually contrary to what was advised. 

Also people who have had a single standard drink are generally not over the limit and certainly won't be for days afterwards, contrary to the current situation with our Drug Driving. 

By here do you just mean the IoM, or the majority of the rest of Europe where the ( arbitrary )  limit is the same, even lower or set at zero?

Ive posted several times that

1. the IoM limit isn’t low by international standards, but,

2. There is no sufficient research to establish at what level  impairment occurs, or for how long it lasts.

[The Phantom]

34 minutes ago, John Wright said:

By here do you just mean the IoM, or the majority of the rest of Europe where the ( arbitrary )  limit is the same, even lower or set at zero?

Ive posted several times that

1. the IoM limit isn’t low by international standards, but,

2. There is no sufficient research to establish at what level  impairment occurs, or for how long it lasts.

1. I didn't compare the IoM to anywhere else.  

2. This is my point really.  After one spliff I might possibly be impaired if it was a strong one (the problem is gauging how strong the weed is, especially if it's not your personal stash and you've not sampled it before).  However I'd be pretty aware of my impairment if so and wouldn't drive.  (I never have more than one drink and drive).  I definitely wouldn't be impaired after a couple of hours.  I 100% wouldn't be impaired the next day. 

Edited April 28, 2023 by The Phantom