The fundamental rules that Canadians live under are really very simple when it comes to how laws can be created, changed and/or set aside, and there are two aspects of "the law" which ought to be almost as simple to apply in any case of alleged crime...

1) Canada's Constitution Act (the most basic law in the land, which lays out the rules under which every law in the nation must come into being), and the Interpretation Act (which lays out the rules under which judges may and may not interpret and apply legal statutes) both state very plainly that the enactment, amendment and repeal of laws (that means *all* laws) is the duty and sole jurisdiction of Parliament... not of "Government" (the party/parties holding nominal power over policy and its implementation), but of "Parliament" (the entire elected legislative body which represents every voter in every electoral riding in Canada).

POL* Parliament ONLY has power to Legislate:

2) Courts may strike a law down entirely if there's a reason in law that they should do so, but they have no power to enact or to substantively amend any law... and both the Constitution Act and the Interpretation Act are very clear about this.

COA* Courts may Only Abrogate a law they have the authority to judge.

GOVERNMENT vs. THE LAW

These two fundamental rules look simple and obvious (and they're also THE LAW in capital letters), so the acronym "POL-COA" really ought to be simple enough to remind all prosecutors, judges and legislators of their duties if they care to hear its truth. Even so, after several years of having ordinary citizens who do understand it drum it into their heads, it still seems that this POL-COA idea is a very difficult concept for our judges and legislators to grasp in any practical sense – *despite* all their experience and training. However, if you're a defendant in a cannabis case, your defence is really as easy as A-B-C:

A) Cannabis prohibition laws in Canada (specifically about possession and by implication cultivation) were declared unconstitutional when Ontario's Court of Appeal last adjudicated Terry Parker's original case in July 2000 and Canada did not appeal that decision.

B) Only hours before the end of the ONE year suspension of that judgement (suspended to allow time for Government to craft and Parliament to enact a new law/amendment allowing the use and possession of Cannabis as medicine), Parliament still had not yet been offered a new Bill to consider, let alone passed a new law.

Instead, Canada's Government (Paul Martin's Liberals at the time) announced and put into force an Order In Council: some regulations (The Marihuana Medical Access Regulations) that modified the unconstitutional Cannabis prohibition law – but the MMAR were only a set of unlegislated regulations trying to fundamentally alter a dying law. Government did this with neither the consideration nor the assent of Parliament.

No new law has been enacted yet to replace what has been struck down by the Parker decision.