Maori Party to oppose medicinal cannabis bill
In a late session in Parliament tonight the Maori Party has indicated that it will vote against the bill being tabled in Parliament to legalise the use of cannabis for medical purposes.
This flies in the face of the desires of many Maori who cannot afford the expensive medicines to treat chronic diseases and pain management, to find not only cheaper but also non-pharmaceutical products.
To even support the bill past the first reading and allow the bill to go to the health select committee would have been the very least the Maori Party could do in its role as representatives of Maori, many of whom grow and use Marijuana.
No thought by the Maori Party has also been given to the fact that a serious percentage of Maori currently incarcerated, are so because of the illegal status of cannabis and this small step in a range of many steps to legalisation could have in some small way led to the eventual reduction of Maori incarcerations due to this status.
This stance of their is nothing short of biggotted, naive, out-of-date and ill-representative of the wider Maori population, of which around 50% have used and do use cannabis daily.
Comments
What's the kickback for this
What's the kickback for this vote? Getting the franchise to stack the containers?
I reckon
I reckon
The kickback is that the
The kickback is that the Greens get to say they did their bit, and can safetly shelve the cannabis issue which has dogged their change of image for a few years now and like the GE issue, can put a big TICK in the 'we gave it a try' box.
Growing your own medicine
'We can't have people growing their own medicine!' shrieked one tory matron during the debate in the house. Really? Isn't that what human communities have done for thousands of years, since discovering they didn't just have to gather them where they occurred naturally? Isn't that one of the principles behind Rongoa - Māori natural health practice?
Ask any morphine addict if refined and mass-manufactured drugs are safer than homegrown herbs. I smell the money or favour of pharmaceutical companies in the pockets of some of these politicians, and/ or their advisors.
Strypes
This is just a guess, but
This is just a guess, but its likely that fuck all Maori contacted the Maori Party in support of this bill.
btw: The bill was very poor. made me cringe. - it proposed that police would distribute cannabis seeds to the ill and appeared to promote self medication with cannabis for people suffering from serious mental illness. very controversial, to say the least...
Weed Wanker: Yes the bill
Weed Wanker: Yes the bill needed a revisit, but that is why there are several readings and rewrites to the process of bills being introduced into Parliament. The bill could have easily had an overhaul at the select committee level.
What a pack of disconnected dreamers.
Did the Maori Party give any statistics of how many Maori that are incarcerated due to growing these plants?
Did they give any statistics as to how many Maori have been arrested and now have criminal records due to the 'common use' of Cannabis by Maori?
Does the Maori Party believe that one of the ways forward for Maori is to reduce the use of Cannabis by Maori?
Their naivity is exposed. Check back in 50 years time, Maori will still be using Marijuana as they are today. Maori will still be a statistic with alcohol as well, which we also had during prohibition, 6oclock closing, and now with the R18ish rating on the purchase of alcohol.
Ending prohibition did not decrease the amount of Maori consuming alcohol, but it did give us the chance to address the alcohol problem within our own hapu without the threat of arrest, it decreased the amount of Maori dying from septicemia and alcohol poisoning from bad batches of home brewed piss, and that is the bit the Maori Party are missing here.
While prohibition exists, a lot of other things exist, like extremely partisan pickings from research to form political opinions. Like the inability of medical experts to run their own trials over years and many participants in order to give them a better, and 'local' understanding of the negative and positive affects of consuming this plant.
Using plants for medicinal purposes is a practice that goes back eons with Maori, and not all indigenous plants can be consumed cart blanc without controls, controls with which Maori developed over a period of time and experiment with various plants. Tutu as an example if consumed will make you very sick and kill you, but even with that plant, Maori figured out a safe use for it through our own cultural practice not some silly fucken law!
Lastly, the argument that is mostly used by legalise cannabis people, and it is true in the Maori case. Prohibition does not stop people from consuming Cannabis, it hasn't in the past, and it never will, something the dreamers in the MP need to get into their thick skulls. While its illegal, the process of procurring it is highly risky, and reinforces the economic status of gangs who are still the primary producers of the lions share of the Cannabis available in every street in this country.
To the Maori Party, you've spent too long away from the tea towel koutou, working with your people shouldn't be a distant memory, and staying in touch cannot be achieved in board rooms and trust meetings. Reconnect, and get with the real picture.
George Rangiaho
Ngati Rongo
pain and meds
I guess I will ask around some of the Maori whanau who are involved with the Maori party and see what this is about. I can't really beleive it to be honest. This is what many of my whanau have been waiting for for many years. To be honest who is ever surprised that voting delivers us nothing?
Still I will ask around the ones who support voting and ask them for answers. I hope they have some good ones.
Love to all suffers