Now that we have a firm date for the legalization of recreational cannabis in Canada, individuals and businesses alike are scrambling to get answers to the many questions surrounding what that will actually look like from a commercial and individual standpoint. Until now, the idea of legal cannabis was still something that somehow seemed off in the future, a possibility even. But that is no longer the case.

“The conversation is really being forced now, and that is a good thing,” says Shawn King, partner and chief creative officer at Arrivals and Departures and host of the podcast, Turning a New Leaf. King, who has been asking everyone from doctors and filmmakers to growers and lawyers about everything related to the upcoming legalization of cannabis on Oct. 17, also recently moderated a Halifax Chamber of Commerce conference on July 11, which was focused on starting a real conversation around cannabis.

“Ninety years of cannabis prohibition are about to end. History is about to be made,” says King. “One of the things that I think matters in relation to this conference, however,  is the idea of getting everybody in a room and just talking about this thing that really no one has talked about before,” he adds. “… we are at this place of acceptance now — this is real, this is happening. So, we owe it to ourselves to be vulnerable and to share that maybe we don’t know everything, but the only thing we can do is to talk about it together and take things as they go.

From all of the people I have talked to through the podcast, it has been very clear that nobody has solutions but everyone has answers, regardless of what side of the coin they sit on [with respect to cannabis],” says King.

Margaret Chapman, vice chair of the Halifax Chamber of Commerce and vice president of Corporate Research Associates, hosted the three-hour event at the Cunard Centre at which more than 300 people showed up to get some much-needed information.

“It was very clear from speaking to our [Chamber] members that they have questions like ‘What effects will October 17 have on their businesses? Will they need to update their policies?’ Things like that,” she says, which was why the Chamber held the event — A Cannabis Conversation: What Your Business Needs to Know.

Knowledgeable panel

Chapman says the Chamber asked speakers and panellists ‘in the know’ to attend the conference and provide their insight on the many looming questions everyone has but are too afraid to ask. “We asked the people who have the answers,” she says.  And those people included Tim Pellerin, senior vice president and chief operating officer, NSLC; Meaghan McIntyre, clinic manager, National Access Cannabis Halifax; David Deveau, regional director occupational health and safety for the province of Nova Scotia; Ian Brown, labour and employment lawyer at Boyne Clarke; and Nick Beynon, board director, Chartered Professionals in Human Resources of Nova Scotia. And the big takeaway Chapman says: “It was reassuring to hear that we don’t have to be as scared [about legalization] as a lot of people are suggesting.”

King agrees. “The sense I am getting is that people are really just trying to figure out what this will mean; what the impact will be on their business. I think there is some caution with people who are just not sure what to expect.  … but I don’t think it is going to be as immediately shocking as some people may think.”

Kings says the general consensus in the business community is that the best thing we can do is to educate ourselves and have an open dialogue. “There are all kinds of scenarios that come up, all kinds of questions … I don’t think that anybody really has the answers for every scenario.”

Ultimately, King says it may simply come down to figuring things out “on a case-by-case basis.” Right now, the best we can do is to understand the laws and get as much information as we can. “I think people shouldn’t be afraid to ask questions,” he adds.

Right now, both Chapman and King say people are still approaching the legalization of cannabis with some trepidation. We have essentially gone from something that was (and still is until Oct. 17) illegal, thus not something most people investigated or educated themself about, especially in relation to their everyday business activities. So, everyone is finding themselves in a very unique situation, be they employers, employees or even law enforcement or others who will be responsible for maintaining and updating the many regulations surrounding cannabis.

“The fact that more than 300 people showed up to the event on a Wednesday morning is very interesting,” says King. If nothing else, it shows that there is a lot of interest in the issue.

Recreational cannabis is set to become legal in Canada on Oct. 17 but there is still much confusion within the business community as to what that will actually look like. (123RF)

I think for some of us, it [cannabis legalization] became real a while ago when mid-December we started working actively on the file. I think what I am hearing though is there is a general level of confusion — where you can consume, how you can purchase it, how much you can purchase, where you can purchase?” says Pellerin. “Beverage/alcohol is our core business and I have spent eight years in the business in jurisdictions across Canada … but arguably this [cannabis] is more complicated than beverage/ alcohol.  And for those that know that business from B.C. to Newfoundland, it is a different model in every province and then when you add on the municipal, provincial and federal layers on top of that — how you can consume it, who can produce it, who retails it, who can buy it, where you can but it — it can become very confusing,” says Pellerin, adding that they are working on some programs to help Nova Scotians answer some of these questions.

Workplace Safety

“One thing I have heard more than other comments from businesses is, 'Tell me what I need to do from a workplace safety perspective.’ And that is rather like someone coming up to you and saying tell me what kind of car I need to buy,’” says Deveau during the panel session. “But that is not a question you can answer without knowing whether they will be hauling a lot of people around or will they haul a trailer? And that is similar to health and safety. There are a lot of factors. The answer to the question is actually a process and will depend on what type of employee you are, what type of risk you have, a number of things, so for us, one of the very positive aspects of legalization is that it gives us as a safety regulator an opportunity to help people understand and get ready for this to understand what requirements are already there,” he adds. He also says, however, that the word “impairment” does not appear anywhere in the legislation, so it is a bit more complicated.

“From a business standpoint, an employer has an obligation to provide a safe workplace. In that regard, there will not be a huge change in what is going on in the workplace, now or six months from now. Employees need to be fit for work. Employers need to be able to lay out the expectations to their employees from a policy perspective,” says Brown.

 “… The legal status of something being used in the workplace is completely irrelevant to the question of whether or not an employer has done what is reasonable from a safety perspective,” Deveau adds.

“It is one of those areas, unlike the HR areas, where those distinctions [of medical vs recreation cannabis] just muddies the waters,” he says.

“We are one of the largest employers in the province with 1,500 plus folks. And you can imagine our environment; we have everything from forklift operators to people who will be specifically selling cannabis and are asking me the question ‘Am I going to be able to test this product before we start selling it?’ … It has become acceptable to have a wine-tasting panel for instance. .. Should we have a tasting room in our head office [for cannabis] …? The quick answer to that is probably not yet, but the best way to sell products is by understanding and knowing them.  So we are struggling with that … we have a ton of policies around alcohol consumption, which tends to be a little more black and white but there is a lot of grey in the area [of cannabis], especially when you start getting into more CDB-driven product forms that some people are using," says Pellerin.

From a medical perspective, McIntyre  says, “I think also we need to recognize that as much as yes, impairment is the most important part of that [cannabis use and workplace safety], there is also a duty to accommodate for medical patients as well, who may need to ingest medical cannabis for their daily operations. Accommodations need to be made for their position if that is something they cannot do while consuming their medication.”

While workplace safety is a key question on everyone’s minds, the cannabis conversation is not over says Chapman. “It’s just the start. Social norms will change slowly, but we need to keep educating ourselves and be open to listening.”

Kings says he has asked a lot of people whether they think legalization of cannabis is a good idea. “The best response I ever had was, ‘We’ll see.’ I think that there is a potential economic impact that could be massive — there have been predictions on what that might be. Whether it will affect performance in the workplace or people’s attitudes toward work remains to be seen. If it all goes according to plan, and it does what the government intended it to do — create a safer environment, make less access for kids and of course, generate some extra revenue, then that will be great.”