Weed with your whisky and wine?

Premier Kathleen Wynne says once Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government moves to legalize marijuana it should be sold in provincially owned LCBO stores.

“It makes sense to me that the liquor distribution mechanism that we have in place at LCBO is very well-suited to putting in place the social responsibility aspects that would need to be in place,” the premier said Monday at Queen’s Park.

Wynne’s surprise comments came the day before she unveils the liberalized sale of beer in the province’s supermarkets. She will be at a Loblaws on Leslie St. on Tuesday morning to launch expansion of selling six-packs.

The government’s Liquor Control Board of Ontario operates 651 outlets across the province, enjoying a monopoly on spirits and imported quality wines.

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Its unionized employees are trained to keep alcohol from minors and the visibly inebriated, and work with groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving to promote safe consumption of alcohol.

Emphasizing that marijuana should be controlled and regulated, the premier said she would work with Ottawa to ensure that health and safety are key priorities as legalization rolls out.

“Obviously, I don’t know what the timeline is with the federal government but it seems to me that using that distribution network of the LCBO — as has been talked about in other provinces, using their provincial institutions — I think that that makes a lot of sense,” said Wynne.

Her views echo those of Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger.

“These are all highly addictive drugs and we want to make sure Manitobans get the best opportunity to be protected from them,” Selinger said three weeks ago.

“At the retail level, we would like to do it the way we’re doing liquor in Manitoba right now, to make sure it’s safe,” he said in Winnipeg.

Last month, Ontario Public Service Employees Union president Warren (Smokey) Thomas said the LCBO “has a solid track record of responsibly selling alcohol and would bring the same service standard to marijuana.”

“If legalization happens, marijuana must be a controlled substance, and no one has more experience retailing controlled substances than the workers at the LCBO,” said Thomas, whose union represents LCBO employees.

“There needs to be a strong regulatory framework in place, including minimum age limits, a ban on marketing, and a plan to prevent cannabis-impaired driving,” he said Nov. 23.

“If we let industry write the rules, we won’t make any headway in reducing the social harm from marijuana.”

Thomas noted the LCBO currently conducts more than 500,000 lab tests on spirits, wine, and beer annually and has secure warehouses and a safe distribution network.

“All the infrastructure is in place for a smooth transition to a safer system. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel.”

In the October election campaign, Trudeau promised to “legalize, regulate, and restrict access to marijuana.”

Such a move would presumably take criminals out of the business and bring money into government coffers through taxation.

If alcohol and tobacco tax revenues are any indication, there are hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes to be made from imposing levies on marijuana.

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Queen’s Park, which is saddled with a $7.5-billion deficit, collected $1.163 billion in tobacco taxes last year and $3 billion in booze taxes — including $1.8 billion from the LCBO, $565 million from beer and wine taxes, and more than $600 million in Ontario’s share of the harmonized sales tax.

Progressive Conservative MPP Tim Hudak (Niagara West-Glanbrook) last month echoed the concerns of many who oppose the government taking control of marijuana sales instead of opening things up to the private sector.

“Well if gov stores are going to sell pot, at least we know quality will be poor, the price high & the hours lousy #420,” he tweeted with a link to a Star story on Manitoba’s plans.

South of the border, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington have effectively legalized marijuana.

But the Canadian Taxpayers Federation has pointed out that cannabis may not be the panacea for cash-strapped governments, noting total national sales in the U.S. were $4.6 billion in 2012. If the provinces adopt levies similar to Colorado’s, that would generate about $628 million a year across the country.

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