Dionne Rose,
Staff Reporter
NICHOLSON
FIVE JOINT select committees of the Senate will be reconvened
during the legislative year to conclude deliberations on various
matters.
Among them are the National Commission on Ganja, which has been
meeting for more than two years and the committee considering the
long-awaited flexible work arrangements.
On Thursday, new Leader of Government Business in the Senate,
Senator A.J. Nicholson, passed a resolution to have the committees
reconvened.
In 2001, Professor Barry Chevannes who headed the Commission on
Ganja, recommended that the Dangerous Drugs Act be amended
specifically to allow, without possibility of criminal sanction, the
private use of ganja.
PROPOSALS
The Chevannes Commission also recommended that the use of ganja for
religious purposes be recognised as lawful, and suggested, among other
things, that ganja use by children should remain legally prohibited.
The range of proposals made by the Chevannes Commission was
considered by Parliament in 2003, and although there appears to have
been fairly broad support for some types of amendment to the law, the
Dangerous Drugs Act has remained unchanged.
Parliament has been slow in making legislative changes for a
variety of reasons, but perhaps the most important of these concerns
the question of international laws.
Flexible work arrangements have been under consideration since July
2000 when a 12-member committee was appointed and charged with the
task of addressing the complex issues involved in implementing
flexi-time locally.