Australia: Regulating cannabis is inevitable. We should talk about getting it right
The annual turnover of the cannabis market in Australia is estimated to be bigger than our wine market. But unlike our wine market, not a cent of Australia’s cannabis is taxed.
In 2014-15, 66,309 people were arrested in Australia for possessing cannabis. The number of people arrested for cannabis consumer offences increased more than 40% between 2004-5 and 2014-15. No one knows what it costs to police cannabis possession and charge and process the large number of people charged every year with minor cannabis offences. But it would not be cheap.
Yet in a recent poll of just over 1,000 Australians by Essential Media, 55% said they thought cannabis should be taxed and regulated like alcohol or tobacco. That includes a majority of Labor (61%) and Greens (74%) voters and almost half (47%) of the Liberal voters. Only 26% were opposed including 13% strongly opposed.
This means that support is...
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