Drug policy Lauterbach has to accept significant cutbacks in cannabis legalization

Karl Lauterbach

Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD) speaks about the planned controlled sale of cannabis to adults in Germany.

(Photo: dpa)

Berlin Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) apparently has to accept significant cutbacks in the plans for a controlled legalization of cannabis.

As the Handelsblatt learned from government circles, the private cultivation and possession of cannabis should be allowed. In addition, the cultivation and sale in so-called cannabis social clubs should be made possible. These are cooperatively organized associations.

However, sales should be significantly restricted. This should only be possible in certain model regions and tested there for five years. The original plan was to allow sales through “licensed specialty stores” and possibly pharmacies as well. Manufacturers are already preparing for a new billion dollar market. These hopes are unlikely to be fulfilled now.

However, a concrete draft law for the project is still pending. The minister had actually aimed for this by the end of March after he had presented the key points in October.

On Friday, the Federal Ministry of Health said that no date could be given. It is a highly complex process. Lauterbach said in Berlin that the law was on the right track and that revised proposals would be presented “shortly”.

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However, the health policy spokeswoman for the Greens, Kirsten Kappert-Gonther, pushed for rapid legalization. “It is important that the controlled release of cannabis is now moving forward,” she told the Handelsblatt. “The draft law is intended to take into account the fundamentals of European and international law, but they are not suitable as a manslaughter argument.”

The reason for the restrictions now planned are precisely those legal bases. For example, in the “Schengen Implementation Agreement”, the states of the Schengen area have committed themselves to “prohibiting the illegal export of narcotics of all kinds, including cannabis products, as well as the sale, procurement and delivery of these funds by administrative and criminal means”.

European legal hurdles

Lauterbach said in mid-March that he had received very good feedback on the project from the EU Commission. According to a resolution, the SPD leadership assumes that “comprehensive legalization for reasons of European law is obviously not feasible in the short term”. It is available to the Handelsblatt.

>> Read more: Lauterbach wrestles with the EU Commission about cannabis legalization: “We need very good arguments”

In the ministries involved, too, concern about a legal failure apparently prevailed. According to information from the Handelsblatt, the federal government expects major resistance from France to the legalization plans.

The pragmatic approach is now being taken, according to circles familiar with the process. Although this could not meet the fueled expectations, it was more promising than legalization, which Brussels would overturn again.

In their coalition agreement, the SPD, Greens and FDP had agreed: “We are introducing the controlled sale of cannabis to adults for recreational purposes in licensed shops.”

In his key points, Lauterbach had proposed that the drug and the active ingredient tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) should no longer be legally classified as narcotics in the future. The acquisition and possession of up to 30 grams of “pleasure cannabis” should be free of punishment, private cultivation should be allowed to a limited extent and sale to adults in “licensed specialist shops” and possibly also pharmacies should be made possible.

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