There are shades of outgoing US President Donald Trump’s behaviour in those behind the Vote Yes lobby to legalise recreational cannabis in New Zealand. Neither seem to be able to accept the outcome of democratic elections.

Sure, the cannabis referendum result was close, but the No vote won the majority of 50.7%. Most parties, including Labour which is now the majority party in Government, said prior to the election that they would consider the result of the referendum to be binding.

Some of the Yes lobby will try and relitigate the referendum result. They’ve already started the allegations of too much money on the other lobbying side, and misinformation. They might want to look in the mirror on some of that; just saying it doesn’t make it true.

We just know from our engagement – which didn’t cost anything and was not to tell people how to vote, but to suggest they be aware the legislation was not complete, medicinal cannabis was already legal, and there were unexplored, unintended consequences – how well-armed the Yes Vote lobby was with social media warriors. Much of the information they pushed was completely incorrect. And let’s just say, they weren’t kind.

The referendum result is a success for the RTF as we worked hard to ensure people were aware of some of those unintended consequences of legalising recreational cannabis, including the impact on road safety and the implications for workplaces. These were the concerns of those we represent.

We know New Zealand has a problem with cannabis use, but legalising it was not going to help those who have to manage workplace health and safety within pretty strict laws, or those drivers for whom the road is their workplace.

None of the policy work around the unintended consequences had been done before putting the Cannabis Legislation and Control Bill to the vote. That left too many unanswered questions. People like a bit of certainty around big decision making and it just wasn’t there with this Bill.

More deaths on our roads are caused by drug-drivers than purely drunk drivers. We think the first step to doing something about that is to give the Police powers and tools to roadside test drivers for drugs in their system.

We hope that one of the first pieces of legislation the new Government turns its attention to is the Land Transport (Drug Driving) Amendment Bill, which was introduced in July this year.

This new law will allow Police to test if drivers are under the influence of drugs, just as they do for alcohol. We will certainly support this Bill as it goes through the proper processes to become law, which were delayed by the election.

While our industry has strict protocols around drug and alcohol testing, we cannot account for the other road users that share the road with professional drivers. We rely on the Police to do that; we need them to have the right tools to keep the road safe.

For the record, the total number of votes received in the cannabis referendum was 2,908,071 – 1,406,973 Yes and 1,474,635 No. There were 26,463 votes where the voter has not clearly indicated the option for which they wished to vote.

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