Breaking News: Dutch Cabinet plans strict coffeeshop policy!

[albes]

This is not decided yet. It was a plan circulating for some time in Limburg (a province in the South, bordering on Germany and Belgium), but now this has make into the government agreement. There is no government yet, but some parties are trying to agree.

I noticed even Dutch forums aren't aware of this sudden but not so subtle change.
Had to edit my post for this...

 

[RudeDog]

Babylonboy....bad name for a cannabis site mate.

 

[CANNATOPIA]

you would think they would want the Tourists money lol how dumb.

 

[elmanito]

The party in Amsterdam is over.Maastricht has taken over its position imo thanks to him.

Namaste

 

[SobStory]

I second that!


Yes i think the cup will be held in the US next year,
so this year may the the end of an era for Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam

youll find that pretty much anyone with a drug conviction wont be granted a visa to enter the states.....wont that exclude a large percentage of participants....


unless they reform the Immigration laws i dont see the cup being held there in the near future

 

[Gastro]

This is not decided yet. It was a plan circulating for some time in Limburg (a province in the South, bordering on Germany and Belgium), but now this has make into the government agreement. There is no government yet, but some parties are trying to agree.

I noticed even Dutch forums aren't aware of this sudden but not so subtle change.
Had to edit my post for this...

Our cabinet will be on "het bordes" next week, we just have to hope the cabinet doesn't survive long enough to change the cannabis laws.
Why you wont find this on a dutch forum, coz unfortunately the avg. dutch smoker isn't politically engaged at all, let alone take the time to read the new programme of the cabinet.

@elmanito, what do onno hoes and his boyfriend have to do with our stupid cannabis policy?

 

[elmanito]

@elmanito, what do onno hoes and his boyfriend have to do with our stupid cannabis policy?

A lot, first the gay community will spend a lot of money in the city with entertainment, restaurants etc and a quite some of them like also to use Cannabis, so money for the coffeeshops.It's all about business.

Namaste

 

[RetroGrow]

Move To Close Dutch Cannabis Cafes

Move To Close Dutch Cannabis Cafes

As we fight for legalization here, the incoming Dutch government is trying to roll back the clock and ban our beloved cannabis cafes, according to the financial times. From the article:

"Coffee shops legally selling cannabis have been a feature of Amsterdam’s streets for more than 30 years, both a magnet for younger tourists and a symbol of the Dutch brand of liberal exceptionalism.

But the fragrant haze found in the city’s 200 or so establishments could be dispersed under plans by the incoming government, which is looking to roll back the “tolerance policy” that has allowed such coffee shops to operate since 1976.

Coinciding with a tightening of laws around prostitution – another tolerated industry – the authorities’ new stance on cannabis is raising questions as to whether Dutch society is moving away from laisser-faire traditions, which have included some of the earliest gay-friendly policies in Europe and the provision of free contraception to teenage girls.

Certainly the outlook for coffee shops is bleak. Among the few policies that the three parties in the new coalition agree upon is the need to cut back on, if not entirely abolish, coffee shops. The governing agreement released last week laid out plans that will force them to become member-only clubs and shut down those located within 350 metres of schools.

They are also advancing the idea of prohibiting the sale of cannabis to non-Dutch residents, which amounts to a death knell for many coffee shops, particularly in Amsterdam, the Netherlands’ biggest city.

“It’s a head-on attack,” says Gerrit Jan ten Bloemendal, vice-chairman of the Netherlands Cannabis Platform, a lobby group opposing the proposal, and himself a coffee-shop operator.

The coffee-shop crackdown comes as part of a broader law-and-order drive promoted in particular by Geert Wilders, the anti-Islam firebrand whose far-right Freedom Party (PVV) made the biggest gains in the June elections. Though the PVV is not formally part of the incoming coalition, it helped draft parts of the legislative programme as part of a deal to support the government.

The new stance comes after years of gradual tightening of the rules governing cannabis sales and a 2007 ban on the selling of alcohol in the coffee shops. After proliferating in the 1980s and early 1990s, their number in the Netherlands has halved from a peak of 1,400 in 1995 to just over 700 today.

“For sure, if the reforms go through it will impact business,” says Maciej Truszkowski, owner of the Sevilla coffee shop, a small, dimly lit venue just off one of Amsterdam’s concentric canals. There are no displays of hemp leaves or any other sign that cannabis is for sale, in line with strict advertising rules, though multiple portraits of Bob Marley hint at Sevilla’s core business.

On a quiet weekday lunchtime recently, a couple of locals walked in to the Sevilla and asked for a cannabis menu. But British and US university students made up the bulk of the clientele. According to Mr Truszkowski, foreigners provide half his business, a figure he thinks is much higher for coffee shops nearer the red-light district, a 10-minute walk away.

Mr Truszkowski argues that if he cannot sell cannabis to foreigners, someone else will. “Even without coffee shops, Amsterdam will be known for its cannabis. One way or another, the business will go on.”

The more stringent legislative tack being embarked on echoes a tightening of rules around the sex industry and measures to halve the size of Amsterdam’s red-light district.

For Paul Schnabel, director of the Social and Cultural Planning Office, a state advisory board, the move reflects a growing view that the tolerance policies have not achieved their aims of controlling the ills associated with drugs and prostitution, rather than a recasting of Dutch liberalism.

“There’s a strong tendency in Dutch society to control things by allowing them. It’s always been there, a pragmatic tradition, typical of a trading nation. We look for better alternatives to problems that we know exist anyway,” he explains.

But, he adds, “Dutch society is less willing to tolerate than before. Perhaps 30 years ago we were a more easy-going society.”

The equation that led to the policy of tolerance has changed in the past decade, as large-scale crime around both coffee shops and the legal sex trade became more visible. In particular, the absence of legal means for coffee shops to acquire the cannabis they sell has highlighted its association with organised criminality.

But the open-minded instincts that helped foster the tolerance policies in the first place have also come to be questioned. And it is not just the far-right that is opposing coffee shops. The traditional parties of power on the centre-right, the Christian Democrats and the Liberal VVD party, have also moved against the tolerance policies they once promoted.

“Definitely there has been a moralisation of the state in recent years, and that has contributed to the coalition’s stance on coffee shops,” says André Krouwel, a political scientist at the Free University in Amsterdam.

“The liberal consensus that helped create those policies – that’s gone now. The pragmatism has been replaced by increasingly moral politics, in a way which is reminiscent of what happened in the United States with the ‘moral majority’ in the 1980s.”

Coffee-shop owners, meanwhile, hope that local officials will continue the tolerance policies even in the face of central government pressure, or that any new law will be repealed by a more liberal government before being implemented. But at the very least, another dramatic reduction in the number of authorized outlets is seen as inevitable."

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2cc0e802-d2fb-11df-9ae9-00144feabdc0.html

 

[BudToker]

Keep your fingers crossed!

- BT

 

[Szslack]

If this ever passes, that day should me marked a global day of mourning. If The Netherlands falter in the cannabis question, it will only be a matter of time before it's all over I'm afraid. Then we can only hope for USA to go full out legalisation before we can enjoy it freely again.

 

[RoachClip]

I would like to take a big shit on the dumb fucks face who proposes these new laws and how do they calculate the dinero's or euro's they would lose every year that would run off tourist and shops that pay taxes. sad how one dumb donkey can spoil it for so many.

 

[denvermmj]

what a bad idea! I'll be there in Nov., I hope nothing changes before that!

 

[BowlFinger]

How many of us have friends over there? None of the new legislation will affect my visits.

 

[RollmeoneKenobi]

Never underestimate the power of the ultraconservative to destroy a great nation. Look at the U.S. since Reagan, or before that with the U.K. after Thatcher. Canada is having similar problems with their ultraconservatives at the moment. The Canadian government allowed Marc Emory to be extradited to the U.S.; where he is now imprisoned. Also they won't acknowledge his right by the canadian constition to allow him to serve his time in Canada. So, let us all pray that at the end of the day cooler heads prevail.

 

[RetroGrow]

This makes it that much more important that we unite and get Prop 19 passed. it's up to us to take the lead in restoring sanity. With the Republicans about to reclaim power, our chances decrease if we delay.

 

[MickeyBlue42]

This will be a sad sad day if they pass those measures :/

 

[Gastro]

Update Here
Some cities have been destined to become testgrounds for new cannabis policies. As in Eindhoven, they are going to try and do something about the backdoorpolicy. One of those is stricter rules and regulations with a pass system, no cash in the shop, and even further reduced amount of weed sold to younger users (3 grams instead of 5). In return the coffeeshops are allowed to have 1000 grams in the shop instead of 500 grams.

A second plan that they want to test from January 1st 2011 is to convert shops into private member clubs. People will have to register as members, Dutch passport holders only, and in return the club is allowed to grow up to 5 plants per member in their system. This way they hope to cut the criminal side out of the backdoorpolicy. However, alot of coffeeshopowners in Eindhoven are very skeptical about the plans since the contact with the mayor is very difficult.
The council of Eindhoven is holding a meeting on this subject on November 23rd.

 

[TanzanianMagic]

The madness is all yours if you think Americans had anything to do with 9/11. BTW this is political and should be yanked.

First of all, you don't get to decide what I can talk about.

Second, this is a thread about Dutch coffeeshop policy, so saying my response should be yanked for being 'political' is absurd. Dutch policy is influenced by US policy and international agreements on drugs, which themselves are guided by US demands and policies, from Harry Anslinger through Richard Nixon and beyond.

Third, if you think that the invasion of Iraq (O.I.L.) had anything to do with Al-Qaeda being there or 9/11, you are dreaming. If you believe that a guy in a headdress that covers all of his head, with a beard that covers most of his face, in robes that cover most of his body, in a cave, on a mountain, in Afghanistan, who used to work for the CIA but doesn't anymore really, directed 20 guys with boxcutters to make it past a $1 trillion air defense system called NORAD, and did so without help, you are dreaming. Or not smoking enough.

But lastly, you don't get to say what I can damned well believe. Homeland Security doesn't rule here.

 

[Ventricosa]

"<i>directed 20 guys with boxcutters to make it past a $1 trillion air defense system called NORAD</i>"

Those were commercial airliners, genius. NORAD had nothing to do with it, except to look at the smoking holes in the ground after the airliners hit.

 

[David762]

Bingo! We have a winner ...

Bingo! We have a winner ...

It's hard to imagine that any Dutch government, conservative or otherwise, would of it's own volition kill off a major source of tourist revenue -- not without some compelling outside influence.

This is surprising. It's interesting that as certain places in the US are attempting to repeal cannabis laws other countries outside of the US appear to be getting harsher policies. Isn't cannabis only illegal in most countries because of pressure from the US government?

I presume that yours was a rhetorical question, though, because the answer is "YES! ... Absolutely YES!". The USA is the single largest contributor to the United Nations, and was instrumental in passage of the UN Single Convention on Narcotics. And the USA continues to support a global War on Drugs through a number of venues -- DEA, FBI, USAID, War on/of Terror leverage, DoD and DHS grants, etcetera.

This massive coordinated effort is, of course, hypocritical considering the US government's own long involvement in the illicit drug trade. This hubris is dismissed with excuses about American Exceptionalism, the USA's role as the "World's Policeman", or else Imperialism disguised as "Globalization". All of this will end, of course -- it has to.

The economic meltdown of September 2008 has exposed the stark reality that the USA as a world power is in it's last throes. We cannot continue to conduct business as usual, but that doesn't mean that the USA will not bring the world's economy down with it, or engage in some further escalation of unprovoked military conflict which could precipitate World War 3. Like President GW Bush once told the President of Argentina, "War is good for the economy (sic)". That evil rationalization is alive and well in even the current USA government, regardless of a Nobel Peace Prize to the contrary.