Ontario’s Liberal government deserves a lot of credit for finally loosening up the province’s antiquated and paternalistic system for selling wine and beer. It’s made it easier for consumers to purchase alcohol safely and responsibly, while also being treated more like actual adults.

Now, though, the government seems determined to repeat the mistakes of the past by giving a new state-run monopoly total control over the sales of recreational marijuana when it becomes legal next July.

The government’s “safe and sensible approach” to regulating and selling cannabis, rolled out on Friday, involves setting up a subsidiary of the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) that will have the exclusive right to sell marijuana, online and through a new chain of standalone stores.

Forty storefronts are scheduled to open by next summer, with about 150 planned by 2020. The illegal “dispensaries” that have popped up all over Toronto and elsewhere will be driven out of business.

Of course, there are ample reasons to be cautious about making marijuana legal. The public and the government are right to be concerned about many issues, including the effect of pot on young people, how to enforce the law against driving while stoned, and making sure bystanders’ health isn’t compromised by people toking up in public.

So it’s good to see the government taking steps to protect young people with strict controls on sales to anyone under 19, a public health campaign, and giving municipalities a say on where stores should be located (not near schools, for example).

It’s right to plan a crack-down on impaired driving. And restricting consumption to private homes makes sense. Few people want to be subjected to others smoking pot on sidewalks and other public spaces.

Still, none of these laudable goals require turning over all retailing to a government monopoly. It’s wrong to set up the choice as one between the safe, secure LCBO and unscrupulous private pot shops ready to sell cheap weed to underage kids.

There ought to be room for responsible private retailers to share this new and lucrative market with government outlets. Adult consumers have a right to choice, and killing the illegal market will be a lot trickier if buying cannabis is made too difficult or awkward.

Ontario went through all this with booze, which by all the evidence is more dangerous than cannabis to both users and the general public. For decades the LCBO (and the Beer Store) made buying alcohol feel like a furtive, shameful experience. It’s taken years to make LCBO outlets open and friendly and to bring in a welcome measure of private competition.

The sky didn’t fall when that happened, and there’s no reason to believe that well-regulated, properly run private outlets would compromise the safety or health of Ontarians. U.S. states that have legalized pot have gone that route, without negative effects. Those who break the law by, for example, selling to minors risk losing their licence, and therefore their livelihood.

It’s understandable that Ontario might opt for a straight-up public monopoly at the beginning. The provinces and territories are under the gun to meet the deadline for legalization set by the federal government. It’s a big job to draft the rules and set up a distribution system by next July.

So it may not be possible to figure out all the details of a parallel private system as well within the time allowed. If that’s the case, the government should at least make clear now that there will be private options not too far down the road.

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And to be clear, that would not mean turning over windfall profits to private operators. The government can set licensing fees, prices and taxes to make sure it collects whatever level of revenue it wants from all outlets, public or private.

The real point is to ensure choice and accessibility, so adult Ontarians who choose to exercise their new legal right to consume cannabis aren’t treated like guilty children and the black market is not allowed to thrive.

The government says it wants to take a similar approach to regulating cannabis as it does to alcohol. If that’s the case, it should follow its own example and not give a government agency exclusive control over sales of marijuana.