Former British Columbia premier Ujjal Dosanjh is urging voters to say No to a referendum on proportional representation because he believes it will usher in extremist parties like those in some European countries.

Dosanjh says Germany, the Netherlands and Hungary require very low percentages of people to vote in candidates with racist views, and that has changed their political landscape in a negative way.

The former New Democrat premier says the party he once led is proposing a proportional representation system that would allow five per cent of voters to elect extremist members of the legislature.

As new drug-impaired driving rules take effect in Ontario July 1st, CAA South Central Ontario (CAA SCO) is reminding motorists of the dangers, fines and penalties of drug-impaired driving.

As of July 1, 2018, under Ontario's Highway Traffic Act, tougher penalties will take effect for young and novice drivers who have alcohol in their system and will add matching penalties for drugs. There are also new penalties for commercial vehicle drivers who have the presence of alcohol or drugs in their system.

Ontario’s cannabis retailing arm is putting pressure on some growers to reduce prices as the province strives to ensure marijuana on its shelves will be cheap enough to compete with the illicit market.

In talks with producers to determine which companies will supply the recreational market, officials for the Ontario Cannabis Store (OCS) are pushing for some strains of flower to be available to consumers at a retail price of about $7.50 a gram, including taxes, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Landlords will be able to restrict smoking and cultivation of legalized cannabis in their residential properties, according to the New Brunswick government.

Tenancy issues were among several topics provincial officials addressed in Fredericton on Thursday, a week and a half after the senate passed the federal government's bill legalizing recreational marijuana.

Pot will become legal to consume and grow in private dwellings on Oct. 17.

Kim Snow, the province's chief residential tenancies officer, said she has been speaking with concerned landlords who wish to prohibit cultivation and smoking.

They will get their wish, she said. Landlords can include those terms in new leases.

AS the legalization of marijuana approaches, there are still unanswered questions, including the effectiveness of roadside drug testing and what prices will be. 

It was originally slated to come into force on Canada Day, but after much wrangling, Oct. 17, 2018, will go down in history as the day the recreational weed prohibition died in this country. With the passage of Bill C-45, it will be legal to buy and consume it.

The passing of Bill C-45 (Legalization of Cannabis) and Bill C-46 (Impaired Driving) highlights a critical safety risk in Canada – the expected increased use of cannabis in the workplace.

To guard against this, a coalition of employers and employer associations from across the country had urged the federal government to legislate alcohol and drug testing for safety-sensitive positions.

Although Ottawa has delayed legalizing recreational marijuana by a month, more than half of Canadians still think it’s all happening too fast, according to an exclusive poll for CityNews by Dart Insight.

Last week, after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the Cannabis Act would go into effect on Oct. 17, a full 55 per cent of Canadians polled said they wanted the date pushed back by up to a year.

In fact, three provinces — including Quebec, where the desire for a delay is highest — asked for more time to figure out how to regulate the production, distribution and consumption of pot.

The penalties for distracted driving in British Columba have steadily increased; however, the punishment for impaired driving in Canada just got much more severe.

In conjunction with Bill C-45, otherwise known as the Cannabis Act, the new laws were created to deter people from getting behind the wheel after ingesting THC.

Canada will officially became the second country in the world to legalize marijuana as of October 17th, 2018. At that time, these new laws will come into effect.

With cannabis legalization on the way, communities across the Northwest Territories have a decision to make — will they hold a vote to ban cannabis after more than 90 years of prohibition ends?

On K'atl'odeeche First Nation territory, however, where intoxicants have been illegal since the 1980s, community members have the opposite choice to make: will they repeal their prohibition for Canada's newest legal drug?

The K'atl'odeeche First Nation Reserve is one of six dry communities in the N.W.T. Under a section of the Indian Act, First Nations can prohibit the sale and consumption of all intoxicants on their territory.

For K'atl'odeeche Chief Roy Fabian, that law includes cannabis by default.