European Cannabis 2023

European Cannabis 2023

Cannabis is widely used across Europe and has been for thousands of years. It’s only the last 100 years since a change in approach of policy by the USA that people have been criminalised for its use. But news of change is here, and it looks like the European Union may be close to reversing some of the damaging laws of prohibition in 2024. This is in part due to several member states including Germany signalling a need for change.

The latest figures suggest there are approximately 22.2 million regular cannabis consumers, spread across the European continent, who consumed the plant over the last 12 months. That is around 7.7% of the population. If we consider lifetime use the figures jump up to 78.6 million people that have used cannabis at some time throughout their lives. This represents around 27.3% of the population, meaning that more than 1 in every 4 people you walk past on the street have consumed a plant that the authorities have criminalised, making their actions criminal.

Most of those people, who include doctors, nurses, firefighters, scientists, and other hard-working individuals from every area of the union, are currently considered to be criminals by law enforcement and are punished on a daily basis as a result in many places.

The most recent news coming from German health minister, Karl Lauterbach, has said negotiations with the EU have been positive after receiving ‘very good feedback’ about their suggested legislative framework.

Germany has currently tabled plans to allow adults to grow three plants at home while possessing up to 30 grams of cannabis flowers. They are proposing a regulated model with the cultivation and supply within a government-controlled market.

Other countries have already forged ahead with their own plans to stop criminalising their citizens for participating in the cannabis industry.

Malta is the first brave nation to say enough is enough. From April 2022 people who choose to grow their own medicine at home will no longer be considered criminals and there are generous regulations to make sure everyone living there has access to the plant if needed.

Switzerland has decriminalised personal use of cannabis and its residents can possess up to 10 grams of the flower. This is the start of a wider process to legalise the industry. It is already well known as a high-quality producer of a range of cannabis products due to its cannabis-friendly regulations.

The Netherlands has long held a sensible approach to the subject for the end consumer. Consumption plus possession of small amounts has been decriminalised for many years. They are currently conducting an experiment aimed at fully legalising the industry.

Luxembourg legalised medical use in 2018 and followed this up with plans to legalise recreational use and the right to grow your own plants at home in 2021.

Austria has a legalised market for scientific and medical purposes. It is currently undergoing a legal process in their constitutional court to explore options to fully legalise the industry, including the possibility of decriminalising personal use.

States across the EEA and the UK allow police forces to spend tens of millions of Euros of taxpayers' money to harass and criminalise those fathers, mothers and other valuable members of our communities because they choose to supplement their diets with the cannabis plant.

In the UK the police spend over 1.1 million hours of time per year dealing with cannabis-related offences. The MET police in London alone spent over 15 million pounds holding suspects of cannabis related offences in custody over the last 5 years. There are thousands of mostly young men languishing in cages up and down the country, costing the taxpayers millions of pounds, while having their lives destroyed. These figures are representative of the wider problem across the European continent.
In these same countries, wealthy and powerful business people make millions of Euros by selling “medical cannabis” that they grow in greenhouses the size of small villages. In reality it is the exact same plant.
Britain is one of the world’s largest producers and exporters of cannabis. In a facility north of London tens of thousands of plants are grown, protected by the law. In local communities, just down the road, vulnerable people are arrested for growing comparatively tiny numbers of the same plant.
For years, desperately ill patients and children across Europe have been unable to access cannabis plants grown locally, for fear they will be arrested by the police. Those same plants are then sent abroad to help patients elsewhere, making some investors a handsome profit. Philip May, husband of the former ‘tough on crime’ home secretary and prime minister of the UK Theresa May, is one such investor, benefitting from this practice. How Theresa managed to sleep at night while punishing ordinary people for doing exactly what her husband was doing is difficult to understand for many patients and consumers.
The war on drugs has caused a considerable amount of social damage by criminalising huge segments of the last five generations of people across large parts of the world. Ironically, it has also caused the same problems that police are trying to combat. Recreational varieties are, for example, being selected for a higher THC content. This is clearly explained by the Iron Law of Prohibition. As Richard Cowen put it “the harder the enforcement, the harder the drugs”. When you make something that people consume for their health illegal, they don’t stop consuming it. Instead, they make the product as strong and as small as possible to transport and store it in a way that best hides it from the police officers willing to take extreme steps to stop them accessing their medicine.
The constant targeting of cannabis consumers by law enforcement has, understandably, seen the lowest rates of trust in police since records began, coupled with a total breakdown of respect towards them.
The hypocritical nature of police cannabis enforcement policy is clearly contributing to the lowest crime solving rates on record and has left several generations of already disadvantaged people even worse off. All of this has had a damaging effect on society. Politicians and law enforcement have created the problems by ignoring the growing body of scientific evidence for the last 20 years.
The supply of cannabis is being controlled by groups who are constantly being targeted and attacked by police and so they aren’t able to participate in a transparent or professional manner. They have no incentive or opportunity to operate in a way that produces a safe and healthy product for their consumers. The cannabis being consumed in places where there are no regulations to produce the plant is much more likely to test positive for pesticides, mould and other unwanted elements that pose a risk to the health of the consumer.
If you knew someone who benefited from consuming cannabis, would you prefer they accessed it from a dispensary on a high street with trained staff who are operating in a clean, safe environment to a set of strict rules whilst paying taxes that benefit their local community? Or would you prefer they buy a completely unregulated product from a completely unknown source in a secretive location? That is what millions of people all over Europe are being forced to do today, and will do tomorrow, and every day until the problem is resolved.

Following years of scientific research, which has added weight to the anecdotal and historical evidence suggesting decriminalisation and regulation are the most sensible way forward, parts of Europe are starting to wake up to the possibilities of a more positive approach.

The potential market for cannabis products across Europe is mind-blowing. Also, the potential revenue and tax income would far exceed the amount we currently spend on policing the traditional market.

Other potential social benefits such as lower rates of opiate deaths, based on data from parts of the US and Canada where these changes have already been implemented, are becoming more obvious by the day. Fewer drink related deaths on the roads have also been reported in those places.

It can only be hoped that the European Union will take a lead on the subject soon and allow its member states to approach the subject in a more humane way. We must stop attacking large parts of our communities for doing something that helps them and, in doing so, stop all the wasted police time and taxpayers’ money.

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