Thank you everyone who has signed and shared the petition, and a huge thank you to the supporters who have paid to promote the petition to help us reach more people. We have been working on several options around political and legal action (discussed below) but need your help to get as many signatures as possible on this petition before Parliament resumes on 7 February. Please continue to share the petition and also consider putting a few dollars towards promoting the petition as this will help us reach more people. You can find the promotion link on the right hand side of the petition page. RESPONSE FROM GOVERNMENT We have received several responses from Sussan Ley's office, the Office of Drug Control and Queensland Health that are inadequate and insulting. They are quite lengthy so we will only post some extracts below but will scan them in full and post to our website shortly. OUR OPTIONS First we want to assure everyone that we stand by our petition and will not be backing down or accepting anything that is not in the best interests of patients. Some of the options we are working on are: 1. Motion to Disallow the Government's changes to Category A of the SAS in the House of Representatives and Senate This action is about access for patients with life threatening conditions who need urgent access under Category A. It will not address issues around cultivation licences, or the lack of a legal supply of cannabis in Australia or unjust state laws. The Government's proposed amendments to the Therapeutic Goods Regulations were not made public or presented to Parliament until 7 November, there was insufficient sitting days left to put forward a motion to disallow them before Parliament ended for the year. However there is still 5 sitting days left in both the House of Reps and in the Senate for a motion to disallow to be put forward once Parliament resumes in February. We have 2 shots at this in the House of Reps and in the Senate. We have asked several Federal MP's and Senators to consider putting forward a motion to disallow the Federal Government's recent amendments to the Therapeutic Goods Regulations that will prohibit patients with life threatening conditions from being able to access any form of cannabis under Category A of the SAS, and the restrictions on access under the personal importation scheme. The Greens and Labor have assured us that they are working on this and other issues around the Government's cannabis legislation. However it is yet to be seen whether or not they will take any action to remedy this unacceptable situation. We are preparing further submissions to support a motion to disallow for presentation to all MP's and will keep everyone updated. This is a complex issue and needs several legislative changes at a Federal and state level which is going to take time because the Federal and State governments have already put in place complex laws that are not working and have done nothing about unjust state laws. However if we stop the Governments regulations going through it will give patients with life threatening conditions their right to fast track access to their cannabis through Category A instead of Category B which can take months as TGA and State approval are needed. You can read more about motions to disallow legislative instruments at the Australian Parliament website: http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/leginstruments 2. Legal challenge The Medical Cannabis Advisory Group held a committee meeting and agreed that our group will take the Federal and State Governments to the High Court over several issues around patient access and the unjust state health and criminal laws. As many of you are aware our group has already achieved several precedents in respect to patient access at a federal level and in Queensland without the need to go to court. However all the Federal and Queensland governments have done is move the goal posts each time and put in place complex legislation and red tape barriers that make lawful access to cannabis almost impossible to achieve and do nothing to end the injustice caused because of outdated state criminal laws. We will post further updates about our legal challenge shortly and how you can help or possibly join the action. 3. Advisory Committee - patient advocates The government failed to appoint an advisory committee as promised after its legislation was passed in February and have only just set this up and appointed one of their own. Although our group did not support the Federal Governments flawed legislation many good people gave their support to the Federal Government ensuring its legislation passed through the House of Reps and the Senate in under 24 hours without any opposition, debate or any scrutiny to ensure there were no unintended consequences. Bi partisan support was given on the proviso that an advisory council would be established immediately to oversee the making of the regulations however that didn't occur and patients have suffered the consequences. Despite several phone calls and emails to the Office of Drug Control we have still not received a response to our requests to be appointed on the advisory council as patient advocates. We will continue to request that our group has a place at the table but are not holding our breath given the government has excluded anyone from the process who has been vocal in opposing their policy and legislation. We are not only disappointed about the federal and state governments inactions and flawed legislation but are furious that patients have been treated with such disregard throughout this whole process especially those patients with life threatening conditions who need urgent access to cannabis now. It is unconscionable that governments have continually misled the public and put vested interests before the health and welfare of patients. No patient should be put in position where they cannot access cannabis medicine in a timely manner and at an affordable price, or be forced to live under the stigma and threat of being charged with a criminal offence under unjust state laws or risk the intervention of child services, and face ongoing discrimination in other areas such as hospitals, education, employment, housing, travel, and family and personal relationships. We know this time of year is hard for many patients with chronic and disabling medical conditions and their families but we hope that everyone can try to find some peace despite the government's cruel and heartless actions and continual failure to make any provisions in the interests of patients. We still have a very long way to go and will continue to work over the holidays to get this matter to court as soon as possible and will post more updates shortly. We also want to thank the groups that have given their support to the petition especially the MCUA for sharing the petition amongst its members and Lucy Haslam from United in Compassion for her advocacy on this issue. Please have a safe and happy holiday season Thank you again Extract from Sussan Ley's letter On 27 October 2016, amendments were made to the Therapeutic Goods Regulation 1990 ... These amendments commenced on 1 November 2016 to facilitate access to imported cannabis products covered by Schedule 4 and 8 to the Poisons Standard ... The amendments complement the new arrangements under the Narcotic Drugs Act relating to the cultivation, production and manufacture of medicinal cannabis products in Australia and marry the access options for imported products with those domestically cultivated and manufactured under the Narcotic Drugs Act. The amendments sub regulation 12A (1) of the TG Regulations specifically remove access under SAS Category A to medicines containing substances covered by one or more of the following entries in the Poisons Standard ... cannabidiol in Schedule 4, cannabis, dronabinol, nabilone, nabiximols, and tetrahydrocannbinols in Schedule 8 and an entry in Schedule 9. The reasons for changes to the TG Regulations are because medicinal cannabis products are not yet considered to be 'established' pharmaceuticals as they are not yet well-characterised from a clinical perspective due to lack of high quality, randomised clinical trials to support their use in various conditions. There may be room to change this approach in the future through the Narcotic Drugs Regulations, if and when it is considered appropriate to do so, having regard to further research and development. It is anticipated that any legislative amendments to the Therapeutic Goods Regulations would be made at the same time. ... with respect to personal importation ... products containing Schedule 4 cannabidiol or Schedule 8 nabiximols may be personally imported ... the importer can import 3 months supply for each importation ... medicines containing cannabis, dronabinol and tetrahydrocannabinols are not permitted ... As mentioned above we will post government responses in full on our website shortly.