South Australia's cannabis crackdown based on 'nonsense', experts warn
Liberal government to increase penalties for possession and introduce prison sentences
Monday, July 2, 2018
The South Australian government’s plan to introduce harsher penalties for cannabis possession is based on “nonsense” reasoning and flies in the face of a global move towards decriminalisation of the drug, experts have warned. SA’s attorney general, Vickie Chapman, announced plans for a dramatic increase in penalties for cannabis possession in the state, with fines to quadruple and prison sentences to be introduced. If passed, the SA bill would overturn three decades of cannabis policy in the state. When the government abolished criminal penalties for possession in 1987 it prompted similar changes in the ACT and Northern Territory. Tim Mellor from the SA Law Society warned that the government’s bill reflected a lack of “evidence-based justification”.
