The Netherlands can keep its coffeeshops open, but….

Higher penalties for drug dealing after EU agreement.

By: Gemma Buters and Johan van den Dongen.

Brussels/Amsterdam, Friday, November 28.

The Netherlands has to increase the maximum penalty for dealing in small quantities of soft drugs (cannabis and magic mushrooms), under 30 grams, from one month to one year. This is the consequence of agreements made by the European Ministers of Justice in Brussels yesterday.

By equalizing the maximum penalties for drug dealing in the entire European Union, the Ministers hope to prevent that drug dealers move to countries with the mildest sanctions. For large scale drug dealing the penalties will have a maximum sentence of between one and three years in prison, criminal organisations can reckon with ten years in jail as a maximum.In practice, the adjustment will not make a major difference, according to Minister Donner, because the Justice Department is not doing much against the trade in soft drugs anyway.

“If people are turned away from drugs by the higher penalties, it is an advantage”, he said, with a wink of his eye. “But concerning prosecution, nothing much will change” Former Judge Boris Dittrich, fraction leader of Democrats ’66, does not expect that Judges will start giving higher penalties either. “This agreement does not mean anything. After all, it is about the maximum penalties, not the minimum penalties. We already have a firm sanction level in the Netherlands; compared to the foreign countries we are in the middle, or a bit on the high side. The sanctions have been increased enormously over the last years. In practice, little will change.”

France and Sweeden wanted the maximum penalties increased to a year and a half, but Donner managed to prevent this. Both these countries are very annoyed about the fact that their youngsters go to buy hash and weed on a large scale in the Netherlands. As it is already known, Minister Donner has pleaded that the coffeeshops to sell to Dutch citizens only. The industry is planning a membership card.
According to Donner, the drug tourism from France has already decreased by the firm approach. On top of that, softdrugs are easy and cheap to obtain in Belgium, which makes the journey to the Netherlands no longer worth wild.

Translation: Sinsemilla Guerrilla

As always, I have to comment to these statements, because it concerns me as a smoker, a Dutchman and, not in the least, as a coffeeshop entrepreneur in Haarlem, the Netherlands. I read contradictions and false statements, all caused or made by Donner, our Minister of Justice. Donner states that the French cannabis smokers buy their cannabis simply and cheap in Belgium, so why is nobody speaking up against Belgium, but only and consistently to the Netherlands. Donner knows most of the cannabis available in Belgium is being bought wholesale in the Netherlands, which is a logical development, there are no coffeeshops or commercial growers in Belgium, so far. Donner also states that we, the coffeeshop entrepreneurs are planning to issue passes to our Dutch customers, to be able to discriminate all other people that walk into our coffeeshops.
That is a complete lie; no coffeeshop entrepreneur wants that, if only it were for commercial reasons, if not for the hacking away of our liberties and rights in this case. The good thing is, if Donner would force us, and me in particular, to do as he pleases, and to refuse non-Dutch our services, goods and company, I will sue him for stimulating discrimination, and for forcing me to behave like a racist. Even in Holland, discrimination is against the Law, the Law Donner serves and protects.

The coffeeshops can stay open, under these conditions, is what I read in another publication on the Internet, as if coffeeshops would just have been closed without Donner complying with the wishes of his foreign colleagues. This change in Law does not even have any effect on the business in coffeeshops, since we are allowed to sell small quantities of cannabis for over 30 years now. The new penalties do not apply to coffeeshop entrepreneurs, only to the black market dealers, so why was this stupid agreements made anyway, and why were the coffeeshops a subject in these negotiations? It is against Dutch and EU Laws to exclude people from any shop, also a coffeeshop, or members club on nationality. How many more Laws have to be bend, ignored or even broken to get a handle on the Dutch coffeeshop system? Why does the EU, which has already lost its financial and economical unity by the lack of input by France and Germany, have a say in our national affairs?

All these questions can be answered:
Our Government is scared shitless of their neighbouring Governments.
Our Justice Minister is a religious fanatic that firmly believes in the gateway theory, caused by the coffeeshops in Holland. The Dutch population does no longer give a shit about what they have to undergo, numb as they have become for yet another bright, political solution to the drug problems that only exist in the minds of the CDA politicians.

I will have to ask the Justice Department if they want to force us into refusing foreign visitors, it seems like they cannot do that, but this ongoing rumour has to come to an end.

Sinsemilla Guerrilla
Willie Wortel’s cannabis-shops, open for the world.
www.hempcity.net

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