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Canada takes a LEAP forward in drug reform advocacy

Frontline drug warriors are losing faith in prohibition. Are there any true believers left?

Matthew Johnston - August 14, 2008

Tony Smith is a retired Vancouver cop and a spokesperson in Canada for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP). Founded on March 16, 2002, LEAP is made up of current and former members of the law enforcement and criminal justice communities who are opposed to drug prohibition. Many of LEAP’s 10,000 members were on the front lines of the war on drugs and today have the passion found only in a convert to reform what they believe is a broken system.

While people like Smith are rare, they are not entirely new to the Canadian political scene. Canadians may remember Vancouver cop Gil Puder. Puder died of cancer in 1999 at the age of 40, but not before making his mark in the movement to end drug prohibition.

While still a member of the Vancouver Police Force, Puder made a presentation called “Recovering Our Honour: Why Policing Must Reject the War on Drugs” at a Fraser Institute conference in 1998.

Puder was threatened with discipline from his employer for his participation in the drug conference, and the Fraser Institute drew criticism from some of its conservative supporters, including sitting Reform Party Member of Parliament Art Hanger, now a Conservative representative.

In the end, though, the Fraser Institute published “Sensible Solutions to the Urban Drug Problem” in 2002 which included a posthumous contribution from Puder.

This watershed publication challenged the Canadian conservative movement to rethink the war on drugs, making opposition to prohibition at least a tolerable eccentricity.

Whether or not the political climate today is better or worse for drug law reformers like Tony Smith, however, is not clear.

Smith joined the Vancouver Police in 1973, one year after the Le Dain committee recommended to Parliament that marijuana be legalized. Then-Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau let law enforcement know that he supported the recommendation, signalling that marijuana charges should be a low priority. According to Smith, however, the signal was lost on rank-and-file police officers.

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