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QUEBEC — Conceding it won’t be perfect and more time would help, the Couillard government is to table its long-awaited framework law on Thursday outlining how the legalization of cannabis will work in Quebec.

“Would it be better if we had an additional year? I think so,” Lucie Charlebois, the minister of rehabilitation, youth protection, public health and healthy living, told reporters Wednesday.

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An extension would give her colleague, Finance Minister Carlos Leitão, the time to finalize negotiations with Ottawa over the distribution of future tax revenues.

And Quebec’s police could better prepare for the problems they believe will follow legalization.

The minister made the remarks in reaction to a Coalition Avenir Québec motion calling on the federal government to delay the legalization of marijuana by one year, to July 1, 2019. Members of the legislature spent the afternoon Wednesday debating the motion.