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MEDICINAL cannabis campaigner Lucy Haslam has taken her fight to the new premier of NSW calling for greater compassion for sick people accessing the drug through the black market. The Tamworth-based advocate adjusting NSW laws could lead to increasing access to medicinal cannabis for patients who, she has previously said, are severely constrained by the current federal system. “[Gladys Berejiklian] said she was keen to make progress on medicinal cannabis,” Mrs Haslam told The Leader. Mrs Haslam said she wanted the state government to be more responsible and compassionate in protecting the state’s patients and used the face-to-face with Ms Berejiklian to pitch changes to the current compassionate access scheme. “At the moment, the scheme only applies to adults with a terminal illness,” she said. “It needs to be expanded to capture children with paediatric epilepsy and cancer too.” She called the departmental responsibility for the scheme to be shifted from justice to health. The anticipated meeting between the premier and Mrs Haslam did hit a few hurdles before it even began, with the face-to-face cancelled twice following flight delays out of Tamworth and Sydney. The meeting was teed up by former premier Mike Baird who was a strong supporter of Mrs Haslam campaign for medical marijuana. “He always said, when he resigned, he would introduce me to Gladys Berejiklian, because he wants to continue to support Dan’s legacy,” Mrs Haslam said. “He said to me ‘Lucy, that’s the only meeting I’ve requested with the new premier.’” Always chipping away at bureaucratic barriers, Mrs Haslam said the next challenge was getting legislation on current police discretion in NSW around medicinal cannabis use. Mrs Haslam is concerned the lack of legislation sends the message the use is still “wrong” and is hoping to take the push to police minister Troy Grant and Attorney General Mark Speakman in coming weeks.

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