Author: Marguerite Arnold

In a unique twist in the annals of cannabis legalization lore, the new head of the German Health Ministry was given an ultimatum by the Bundestag’s budget committee to submit a passable recreational cannabis bill by the end of the summer

The German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach has been given a unique incentive to submit legislation that can be passed by the Bundestag by the end of the year to legalize a recreational cannabis market. Do it or have your PR budget withheld.

For his part, Lauterbach almost simultaneously issued statements to the press that he was going to speed up the process.

This means that Germany will have, all things being equal, a fully recreational cannabis market by the end of this year – legislatively at least. How long a gap between the bill’s passage and implementation is anyone’s guess. However, given the track record of legalizing jurisdictions so far, it is not inconceivable that while decriminalization and allowances for record expungement may take place more or less immediately, the actual market start may be delayed for 12-24 months. See Colorado and Canada, if not Holland.

What Could Be in The Cards

There are many question marks now on the table about what could happen next. One thing is for certain. While the Bundestag might, for convenience purposes, leave the cultivation and distribution question alone, this will in turn lead to further legal action. Nobody is happy about the cultivation bid, much less the monopoly distribution bid issued by BfArM. Keeping that as the status quo for the first source of recreational cannabis in Germany is unlikely. Even with the giveaway of open season on dispensaries (although how these should be awarded is another variable here).

Regardless, here are some of the issues that have been bandied about. Home cultivation is apparently on the table, in a win for many activists, but whether that differs for patients and recreational users is another discussion. So is the necessity for patients to have a grow license of their own.

Expect to see a heavy presence of law enforcement and heavy penalties for driving under the influence. Also expect to see at least a discussion of online shops and delivery services, even if only allowed by individual dispensaries.

It is going to be a very interesting 8 months as Germany takes its place as the second large, western economy to now proceed down the path of full and final recreational cannabis reform.

Government leaders have been quoted recently saying that home grow would be a necessary component of recreational reform

Last week, German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach announced that German recreational reform should be prioritized this summer. However, that is not all that is afoot in Germany. Within the last week, there have also been statements across the political landscape of the ruling “Traffic Light” Coalition that home-grow will also be included in this discussion.

Citing reasons that ranged from inevitability to an awareness that patients who still cannot convince their health insurers to reimburse them will almost have to be able to grow their own, voices from the SDP, the FDP and the Greens all discussed their reasons for allowing Germans to not only buy their weed but grow it too.

Now Come the Details

Given the reliability with which German politics tick (and of course, the impossibility of predicting anything in this industry) it is, however, highly unlikely that both a Health Minister and other members of the ruling coalition would make such statements with nothing to back them up.

However, what details are actually included in this first tranche of legalization legislation is still very unsure. There is also a lot of ground to cover.

Here are the biggest outstanding issues:

1. It is widely rumored that the government will allow specially licensed dispensary shops to sell recreational cannabis. In Germany, you can find wine, beer, and spirits in almost every grocery store. That is unlikely to happen with cannabis for the foreseeable future. However, do not expect to see a suggestion that cannabis will be sold in government-run stores – as Canada initially tried to implement (and then pulled back after widespread opposition). How such licenses will be made available is a big question. Will there be an open season or some kind of lottery system run by the states or municipalities?
2. How these new stores will be stocked is another question. Will there be additional cultivation licenses that can be applied for or will the existing medical license holders be given a monopoly on growing all high THC cannabis in the country? 
3. Home grow. If this is allowed, will it be permitted by the number of plants, licenses, or both?
4. Edibles and extracts. This is going to be hard-fought territory and there is almost no precedent for the same either in Europe or much of North America.

For now, there is a great deal of speculation and even maneuvering on the chessboard. However, it is clear that the tide is turning in Germany. The question now is how far, and how fast?

Karl Lauterbach makes public statement about prioritizing recreational cannabis reform in Germany this summer

In a surprise announcement, the German Health Minister, SPD-affiliated Karl Lauterbach, has now thrown his weight behind a stepped-up schedule for cannabis legalization. Namely, he wants to put this on the summer legislative agenda rather than pushing it back to this fall (or later) as had been widely rumored.

As quoted in Handesblatt, Lauterbach said that he has “changed his mind about this in the past two years…I’ve always been an opponent of cannabis legalization, but I revised my opinion about a year ago.” He now believes that the dangers of the status quo outweigh the dangers of recreational reform.

Lauterbach’s statements about cannabis reform were part of his call for stepped-up action on several pressing issues facing the German healthcare system. Namely the need for a greater contribution from German citizens to address the huge shortfall the statutory health insurers are facing as well as the digitalization of the healthcare infrastructure.

His comments also come at a time when there is growing momentum from all coalition parties to not kick the cannabis legalization discussion can down the road anymore. During the first quarter of 2022, despite making cannabis legalization part of the election platform that put the Traffic Light coalition into power, the only thing emanating out of Berlin for months was calls for delay. The excuse was both the lingering Pandemic and then the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Even more interesting is that Lauterbach’s comments come at a time when all three coalition partners have begun to publicly support the idea of home-grow as part of the initial reform law. This too had been widely rumored to have been dropped from discussion.

Drivers of Reform

There are several reasons that are likely behind this interesting about-face by leading figures in the new government to suddenly prioritize cannabis reform this year.

The first is undoubtedly the fact that the medical efficacy of cannabis cannot be denied anymore – meaning that the beleaguered health insurance companies will be increasingly under the gun to reform their policies about coverage – and pay for coverage of more people. That has been one of the most problematic aspects of the limited medical reform compromise made into law in 2017. Insurers have routinely turned down about 40% of applicants – forcing those who can to sue for individual compensation and those who can’t into the black market, increasing the risk of prosecution for merely being chronically ill.

The second is that with full recreational reform, patients who have been turned down for coverage – or cannot find a doctor in the first place will, at least no longer be criminalized by taking matters into their own hands.

Further, if patients are finally allowed to grow their own, additional pressure will be taken off a healthcare system that has been horrifically slow in the acceptance of medical cannabis in the first place.

As a result, it may be, after months of delay and diffusion, that there is finally a push for cannabis reform that may even take place this summer – at least on a legislative level. That is good news indeed.