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Speaker 1: This is gam Nation with Jonesy.

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Speaker 2: We spoke about this on the program yesterday. It's been

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Speaker 2: in headlines and in the news this week the debate

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Speaker 2: about legalizing cannabis in Australia. The Green's wanted done and

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Speaker 2: are bringing this before Parliament today. Green Senator David Shuebridge

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Speaker 2: is on the line to talk about what's going to

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Speaker 2: be happening today and why this is important. Hello Senator, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: hey man, how are you very well?

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Speaker 1: Thank you.

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Speaker 2: So you're not actually putting together the bill today, you're

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Speaker 2: giving notice. What does that mean?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, this is how you kick off making a new law.

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Speaker 1: You've got to put on a motion and say I

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Speaker 1: give notice, I'm going to make a law about X

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Speaker 1: and in this place where any notice, We're going to

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Speaker 1: introduce a bill to legalize, to regulate and to allow

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Speaker 1: for the lawful sale and consumption of cannabis. And that's

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Speaker 1: how we kick it off.

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Speaker 3: And it gets a lot of mixed opinions as well.

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Speaker 3: We had this on our pub test yesterday.

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Speaker 4: I'm actually on cannabis oil which hasc in it to

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Speaker 4: help with live pain. It's also our mood stabilizer and

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Speaker 4: I don't take it all the time. Because I'm the

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Speaker 4: only one for license, and the current legislation says if

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Speaker 4: it's in your system, I'm not onder the influence of it.

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Speaker 4: So if I get pulled over, I have to then

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Speaker 4: go to court. You know, I might have taken it

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Speaker 4: two days ago. Just ridiculous. They need to change the

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Speaker 4: laws straight away.

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Speaker 3: So he's talking about that. But then on the other hand, no, I.

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Speaker 4: Don't think it does. What about itsophenia? Don't you think

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Speaker 4: it causes that as well?

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Speaker 2: And David, that is one of the concerns is that

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Speaker 2: young minds being allowed to take it when and where

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Speaker 2: they like it, recks have it with young minds. What

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Speaker 2: would you say to.

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Speaker 1: That, Well, we see this legislation as a harm reduction measure. Yes,

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Speaker 1: there can be some harmful effects from cannabis, but if

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Speaker 1: you look at the kind of spectrum of drugs and

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Speaker 1: those from the most to the least harmful, cannabis is

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Speaker 1: in the less harmful side of that spectrum, significantly less

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Speaker 1: harmful than alcohol and tobacco. But you know, of course

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Speaker 1: we have restrictions that it can't be sold or consumed

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Speaker 1: by minors, But really the bulk of the harm that's

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Speaker 1: happening at the moment, and the way we deal with

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Speaker 1: cannabis is the harm of young people in particularly getting

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Speaker 1: dragged through the criminal justice system, being criminally prosecuted, sometimes

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Speaker 1: losing their job, having their lives turned upside down simply

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Speaker 1: because they choose to have a joint with their mates

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Speaker 1: on a Friday night. And for me, if we're talking

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Speaker 1: harm reduction, that's the best way to reduce harm at

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Speaker 1: the moment. Get it out of the hands of the

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Speaker 1: organized crime. Get it out of the hands of criminals.

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Speaker 1: Stop having young people's lives turned on their head because

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Speaker 1: they choose to have a joint them.

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Speaker 3: Did you have any projections of how that would actually if,

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Speaker 3: say the bill goes through and marijuana does indeed become legal,

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Speaker 3: do you have any projections of what it will do

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Speaker 3: to the crime in this country?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, thankfully, we've got really good sort of

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Speaker 1: real time studies happening all across the world at the moment,

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Speaker 1: because straight after state in the United States legalized cannabis,

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Speaker 1: Canada has done it in one shot, fed really like

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Speaker 1: like we're planning to do here with this bill in Canberra.

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Speaker 1: We've seen Portugal move more than a decade ago, and

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Speaker 1: across the board. We see flat and sometimes declining crime rates,

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Speaker 1: particularly assault and crimes is often associated with alcohol. There's

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Speaker 1: a very minor substitution effect that you've see most of

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Speaker 1: those jurisdictions, less alcohol being consumed, marginally more cannabis in

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Speaker 1: some of those jurisdictions, and that particularly sees assaults and

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Speaker 1: some of those angry offenses that follow from alcohol consumption

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Speaker 1: being slightly reduced. But it isn't a huge effect. It's

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Speaker 1: very marginal in terms of the outcome of any kind

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Speaker 1: of criminal offending.

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Speaker 2: What do you think your chances are, Senator of getting

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Speaker 2: this through because we've seen with assisted dying and things

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Speaker 2: like that. There's a very conservative scene in Parliament, isn't there.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. And one of the reasons we're bringing well, there's

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Speaker 1: two reasons we're bringing it now is we've got some

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Speaker 1: constitutional legal advice and it's the first time it's been

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Speaker 1: asked for and received and it says we can do it.

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Speaker 1: We don't have to wait for states and territory to

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Speaker 1: move and often at a state level, and you know,

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Speaker 1: I suffer the state politics. I moved here. You saw

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Speaker 1: just how powerful the police were and what a big

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Speaker 1: influence they were on state politics and hopefully we can

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Speaker 1: step away from some of that and get it done federally.

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Speaker 1: But this constitutional legal advice says we can just get

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Speaker 1: it done. The federal Parliament has the power and if

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Speaker 1: it moves to legalized cannabis here in the Parliament in Canberra,

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Speaker 1: that would basically turn off all those state laws that

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Speaker 1: make it a crime. And that's the way of doing

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Speaker 1: it across the nation and literally joining the rest of

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Speaker 1: the world.

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Speaker 3: Well, good luck passing it around. You know, hey man,

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Speaker 3: don't bog out that bill.

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Speaker 1: Well, I mean, we we do have a new parliament, right,

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Speaker 1: We've got now Greens are in the balance of power.

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Speaker 1: We've got a record number of Greens. We've got a

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Speaker 1: bunch of you know, immunity minded independence and the country

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Speaker 1: is looking for us to break some of that crappy

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Speaker 1: old politics where we've stuck in the twentieth century. And

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Speaker 1: if you've got laws across the country the criminalized cannabis,

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Speaker 1: and you know, more than forty percent of Australians have

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Speaker 1: tried cannabis. If you've got laws that make almost half

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Speaker 1: the country criminals, well, well those laws are plainly nonsense

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Speaker 1: and we stuck them in the garbage bit.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense to me.

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Speaker 3: Senator David Schubridge, thank you for joining US.

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Speaker 1: No worries, good thing.