In New Zealand it is a criminal offence to possess, grow, or supply cannabis or cannabis extracts, or even any implement used in the smoking of cannabis. It is a class C drug over here and while even possession is potentially punishable by imprisonment, it is extremely rare except for offenders with prior serious offencess or repeat offenders.
There are numerous cases of repeat offenders who have continually been caught cultivating large quantity's of cannabis for personal use, wasting the courts time, refusing to recognise the charge, and being let off with, as you call, a slap on the wrist - miniscule fines, discharge with conviction etc
See
www.norml.org.nz for details about some of these
There is a fairly strong movement calling for the decriminalisation of Cannabis, and some strong pro cannabis reform groups such as Norml who continue to push for the legitimacy of its use.
One current large political party (about 5% of the overall vote at the last general election), the Green party, strongly and openly supports cannabis reform (decriminalisation), but was unable to come to even a vote of confidence agreement with the major political party labour due to divergent views over genetic engineering. Instead we are currently slapped with an extremely conservative minister of health and a christian based political ally keeping an overall majority in the house of rep's only pleading their support on the basis of cannabis law reform NOT being undertaken in any way shape or form (yes, this was a specfic term of their agreement)
In general however, labour is an extremely liberal party, new zealand is generally at the leading edge of pro active law reform, and we have some drugs which are classed as fairly serious overseas that are perfectly legal here (BZP, TFMPP). There is a new bill being considered very carefully at present which purports to introduce a framework for a new class D of drugs which will keep certain solvents, party pills etc legal but tightly regulated.
With a general election coming up this year, the Greens still polling reasonably, United dropping off the bottom of the charts, and the conservative health minister set to have his own minor political party without a seat in parliament, I would quietly suggest that the marijuarna laws will be getting very carefully considered and changed over the next 4 years, most likely with a quiet drop down to class D - the last select committee report essentially said there is insufficient information at this time and we need to wait and see, often this means lets look at other common law countries, see what they are doin gthen copy it adding our own unique touch - Canada and Australia are msot persuasive upon our legislature.
Basically what Im getting at is things are looking very bright and sparkly for the near future in New Zealand. Police are generally very lenient over possession as it is, and will be as likely to caution you and simply confiscate as they are to arrest you (assuming you arent causing any other trouble) and smoking pot is fairly deep seated in New Zealand culture - a lot of people do it all the time without any problems. Obtaining cannabis is pretty straightforward, and just quietly, our green blows yours the fuck out of the water and is a LOT cheaper.
You could do a lot worse for cannabis law than NZ.