Italy: 630,000 signatures collected for the legalization of cannabis

The Italian authorities certified last Wednesday that the popular initiative which seeks to legalize cannabis in Italy has gathered enough signatures to be put to referendum next spring. However, there is still one procedural stage to go before the measure is officially presented to the electorate.

Approximately three months after the advocates had submitted the 630,000 signatures, the Supreme Court of Cassation informed the campaign that it had validated them.

Now that the signatures have been confirmed, the referendum will be submitted to the separate Constitutional Court, which will determine the legality of the proposal's provisions. This opinion will be delivered on February 15 and, if it is deemed legal, the government will set a date for the vote.

«While we wait for final validation... we are already starting to organize a national mobilization to inform all citizens that cannabis should be legalized,» the campaign said in a Facebook post.

The Constitutional Court will now examine whether the measure conflicts with the Constitution, the country's tax system or the international treaties to which Italy is attached. The lawyers are confident that they have sufficiently limited the scope of the proposed reform to meet legal standards.

If the courts allow the referendum, voters should have the opportunity to decide on the policy change between April 15 and June 15.

What's in Italy's proposal to legalize cannabis?

The Italian proposal would completely end the criminalization of cannabis cultivation, but would maintain a decriminalized fine for possession and use of the substance.

Under this proposal, the processing of cannabis would also remain criminalized. Products such as hashish would continue to be banned. Nor would there be a system for the legal, regulated sale of cannabis.

Part of the reason the campaigners were able to gather so many signatures so quickly was a change in policy that allowed them to collect signatures online rather than in person only.

«We believe that the fact that we were able to collect more than 500,000 signatures online in a week will be taken into consideration as a strong demand to modify an unreasonable set of prohibitions in our laws,» said Marco Perduca, chairman of the referendum committee, at Marijuana Moment.

He added that the validation of the signature by the Court of Cassation «marks a historic event» in Italian history.

If the referendum passes, a simple majority vote will be required for it to be promulgated.

Growing interest in legalization in Europe

Italy would not be the first European country to legalize cannabis. The smallest member of the European Union, Malta, adopted this reform last month.

Germany's new coalition government also recently unveiled some initial details of his legalization plan of cannabis, even if the reform is likely to take some time to implement.

In Luxembourg, the Ministers of Justice and Internal Security unveiled last year a proposal to legalize, which still has to be passed by Parliament, but is expected to be adopted. For the time being, the country is focusing on domestic legalization. Parliament is expected to vote on the proposal in early 2022, and the ruling parties are in favor of the reform.