On Friday a judge upheld a government plan to introduce a “weed pass” that will sharply restrict foreigners from access to “coffee shops”, the term used for a variety of drug-friendly outlets around the country. The plan will turn coffee shops into private clubs with membership restricted to Dutch residents and a limit on membership. Although still highly tolerant of drug use, the government wants to curb a thriving illegal trade in which residents from neighbouring countries stock up in the Netherlands before heading home to sell the drugs illegally.
A lawyer opposing the move argued that it’s discriminatory to have one drug policy for residents and another for visitors, but the real pain from the ruling will be felt by the tourism industry, which profits mightily from tourists attracted by the ability to sit around smoking dope without getting arrested. (Though marijuana is technically illegal, police ignore its use in small amounts in designated outlets.) Amsterdam alone has 220 “coffee” shops, and attracts 16 million tourists a year, up to 40% of which are estimated to be drawn by the lenient approach to pot, and its famous red light zone (where most of the coffee shops are located.)
“In order to tackle the nuisance and criminality associated with coffee shops and drug trafficking, the open-door policy of coffee shops will end,” the Dutch health and justice ministers wrote in a letter to the country’s parliament.
New cannabis-for-residents-only laws are due to roll out on 1 May in three provinces and nationwide in 2013.
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