Madam Speaker, I was astonished to hear my colleague opposite talk about the health benefits of marijuana. Here is the position of the Canadian Medical Association:
The CMA has longstanding concerns about the health risks associated with consuming marijuana, particularly in smoked form.
Children and youth are particularly at risk for marijuana-related harms, given their brain is undergoing rapid, extensive development.
I would like to focus, however, on the government's claim that somehow legalizing marijuana will put paid to the illegal trade. A perfect policy experiment just happened in the last decade or so, and that is the case of cigarettes. Cigarettes are legal. They are so-called controlled. They are kept out of the hands of children, and so on. However, the illegal trade has not only flourished, but it has expanded, and that is because, as the taxes on “legal” tobacco are increased, it is very easy for organized crime to undercut the so-called government cigarettes. The exact same thing will happen with marijuana. The government wants to increase the tax. It will make the price so high that organized crime will easily—