Read the full story here.
Nope, you've got it right. The author should have mentioned it in this article.Weren't Crown prosecutors recently instructed not to prosecute drug posession crimes though? Did I misunderstand that? I hope not because I've been "open carrying" so to speak.
I guess the issue is that the current prosecutorial directive, although quite expansive, is a strong suggestion more than a hard rule, and Vancouver's mayor and company believe that full, legislated decriminalization will do more toward helping attenuate the opioid crisis (presumably via drug possessors being more willing to seek help). Although I'm a strong supporter of decriminalization, I've always thought that the argument that it would significantly help with the opioid crisis was a tenuous one. The drugs are still going to be coming from the same sources.
I don't know. I think it could take a while. Drug decriminalization just doesn't have the same popular support that cannabis legalization did. Like everything, they will only do it when they feel like they will get either a political gain or relatively little political loss from it. The Liberals do believe in drug decriminalization as evidenced by the fact that the party membership voted for it internally. The directive from the head prosecutor (ostensibly independently from the government, but of course she wouldn't have put it out under Harper) was in line with that. A way to get effective decriminalization without any political hit (not a whisper from the opposition about it).