New South Wales
New South Wales has been leading the way when it comes to patient access since March 2018, when Health Minister Greg Hunt announced that the state government had “taken a machete” to red tape, allowing for “direct and immediate access” to medicinal cannabis.Order weed in New South Wales Buy marijuana in New South Wales
The government claims that this has slashed approval processing times for cannabis prescriptions, as patients in NSW now only require a single clinical assessment from the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA). Previously, approvals were overseen by both the Commonwealth and NSW Health, and could take weeks to be granted.
“Where the doctors say it is required, we’ll make sure it is available in a matter of days,” Hunt said.
“New South Wales is now the national leader—we have had tremendous discussions with Tasmania and Victoria, and so I am hopeful that will make progress with them very shortly—but the benchmark has been set here and this is about saving lives and protecting lives, it’s about giving people the capacity to go through their treatments.”
The NSW Minister for Health and Medical Research, Brad Hazzard, also argued that the legislative changes will have a huge difference to patient quality of life.
“For that reason NSW has a $6 million advisory service that we established just a few months ago, and what that enables doctors to do is make a phone call and find out how can medicinal cannabis possibly assist your patient,” he said.Buy marijuana in New South Wales
In February 2019 Elixinol Global Limited elected to invest almost $10 million in the state, purchasing 60 acres of cannabis growing land in Northern NSW for 2.6 million. The land has 3,400 square metre of space that the company intends to use for a $7 million planned greenhouse facility, although it has yet to receive a Medical Cannabis License from the Australian Office of Drug Control.
The managing director of Elixinol, Linda McLeod, said that the company anticipates the facility will be capable of producing 2,000-5,000 tonnes of medical cannabis per year.
“It’s a fully integrated state of the art, highly secured cultivation and manufacturing facility of farmer grade medical cannabis product,” she said.Buy marijuana in New South Wales
“Assuming the development application is approved the construction will start around April or May. It’s contingent on the timing of the application and our licences.”
“What we will endeavour to do is use local contractors as much as we can for construction and ideally we would like to employ all our professional staff locally.”
At the same time, the NSW Greens have also begun pushing a plan that would see the recreational use of cannabis legalised in the state. The party have promised to introduce a private member’s bill to legalise, license, and regulate recreational marijuana use within the first 100 after the election, along with moving for a parliamentary inquiry into the legislation.
If passed, the bill would allow NSW residents to grow up to six cannabis plants at home for personal use, as well as consuming it wherever it is legal to smoke tobacco.
The Greens say the legislation would raise an estimated $200 million per year in additional tax revenue for the state government, via a mix of GST, licensing fees, and reduced criminal prosecution costs.Order weed in New South Wales
Greens MP and spokesman for Justice and Policing, David Shoebridge, claims that it “makes no sense to treat the consumption of cannabis as a crime”.
“We are wasting millions each year and missing out on licencing revenues that the state desperately needs.Order weed in New South Wales
It’s time we stopped taking such a backward approach to a drug that over one-third of Australians have used.Order weed in New South Wales
No one is saying that cannabis is without any harmful effects, however making it illegal does not magically make it safer, in fact it does the opposite.”
“By making cannabis legal, consumers can be certain of the concentration and quality of the product they are using, can be assured it meets minimum health standards and can be given accurate information about its likely effects,” Shoebridge said.