Left-wing parties and cannabis

In the PS (Socialist Party) and among the Divers Gauche groups, we currently have 9 declared candidates, plus 8 possible candidates. Opinions vary. We differentiate here :

• declared candidates in the primary organized by the PS
  • Jean-Luc Bennahmias (Front démocrate)
  • Gérard Filoche (PS)
  • Sidi Hama-Hamidou (Radical Left Party)
  • Benoît Hamon (PS)
  • Marc Jutier (PS)
  • Marie-Noëlle Lienemann (PS)
  • Arnaud Montebourg (PS)
  • François de Rugy (Ecologist Party)
• undeclared candidates
  • François Hollande (PS)
  • Manuel Valls (PS)
  • Sylvia Pinel (Radical Left Party)
  • Emmanuel Macron (En marche)
  • François Bayrou (MoDem)

Candidates declared for the primary organized by the PS

Jean-Luc Bennahmias - for legalization

Jean-Luc Bennahmias,member of the Union des démocrates et des écologistes and Chairman of the Front démocrate, is in favor of legalization. He declares, and I quote, “For my part, I consider that extremely controlled legalization and supervised therapeutic use - while obviously retaining the ban on under-18s as for alcohol and tobacco - would enable us to break the deadlock into which the logic of the «war on drugs» has trapped us”.

Gérard Filoche - for legalization

In his article »Regulation against the society of violence: another world is possible», Gérard Filoche,a former labor inspector and member of the Socialist Party's national bureau, outlines the need for an irreproachable judicial system and for the sale of cannabis to be regulated through associations, whose raison d'être would be to supply their members with cannabis in a supervised manner. In short, he is in favor of legalization, along the lines of Spain's Cannabis Social Club.

Sidi Hamada-Hamidou

Sidi Hamada-Hamidou is a Mahoran educator and a member of the Radical Left Party (not the PS). We apologize in advance for this gentleman, but we were unable to find his position on the subject despite our requests on his Facebook.

Benoît Hamon - for legalization

Benoît Hamon,Member of Parliament for Yvelines, former Minister of National Education, Higher Education and Research, and member of the Socialist Party's national bureau. is for legalization.

He recently declared on France Info: «I think above all that we need to tackle the real gangrene, namely the cannabis economy», in reaction to the attack on four police officers on the edge of the difficult Grande Borne housing estate in Essonne. «That's why my position is to legalize cannabis, not just decriminalize its use. So that tomorrow, we can kill off this traffic. Most of the players involved know that if there's no legalization, i.e. if we don't break up these parallel economies, we won't be able to regain control of these territories. If we want to bring back the Republic, we have to go through this. I know it's a difficult debate, but I've made up my mind,» said Mr. Hamon.

He therefore proposes legalizing cannabis, with state-controlled distribution, to «dry up the underground economy and violence».

Marc Jutier - for legalization

Marc Jutier, engineer, member of the Socialist Party, president of Fraternité Citoyenne, writer and lecturer, is in favor of French-style legalization: ”The 1970 law and its article L.630, which punishes any attempt to challenge the law, prevents any public debate. The first step is to develop an information and prevention policy free from the censure of Article L. 630. Next, we need regulated distribution of cannabis by the Seita, with the possibility of buying only small quantities at a time (all advertising and marketing prohibited)” and adds “Generally speaking, we need to discourage drug use by means of an examination on the harmful effects of each drug, which could only be issued to people over the age of 21.”

Marie-Noëlle Lienemann

Marie-Noëlle Lienemann, Senator of Paris, twice Minister of Housing and member of the national bureau of the Socialist Party, has not yet taken a position on the subject. We have contacted her campaign team but have received no response from them as yet.

Arnaud Montebourg - against

Arnaud Montebourg, In 2011, the former French Minister of the Economy, Productive Redress and the Digital Economy stated that he was “firmly opposed to any form of cannabis liberalization”, and that it was “a dangerous drug for young people”. In 2012, he specified that he was not against the organization of a referendum on the subject if EELV requested it. He added that it was “out of the question for the State to send out a signal of decriminalization. I don't want the children of France to be able to buy cannabis in supermarkets, and we're already spending billions to combat alcohol and tobacco addiction.”

François de Rugy - for legalization

François de Rugy, vice-president of the French National Assembly and president of the Ecologist Party, MP for Loire-Atlantique, is in favor of legalization “on condition that sales are monitored in tobacco shops”. He adds, “We cannot continue to do nothing”.”

Undeclared candidates

These candidates have not yet declared their candidacy for the primary organized by the French Socialist Party, but it remains a possibility.

PS: François Hollande - against legalization

François Hollande, our current President of the Republic, has categorically refused to open a debate on the subject throughout his term of office. We don't really know what he thinks personally, but his actions speak for him. Five members of his government wished to open the debate (Duflot, Peillon, Taubira, Baylet and Le Guen) and were quickly called to order with a communication from the government spokesman reminding them that the subject was not on the agenda.

PS: Manuel Valls - against legalization

Manuel Valls, the current Prime Minister is categorically against it. In 2011, he declared: «The idea of legalizing cannabis trafficking makes no sense. It goes against my values, because drugs are addictive».»

Radical Left Party: Sylvia Pinel - for legalization

Sylvia Pinel, former Minister of Housing, Regional Planning and Rural Affairs, President of the Radical Left Party, MP for Tarn-et-Garonne and Vice-President of the Languedoc-Roussillon-Midi-Pyrénées region, is in favor of legalization. On her party's website, she explains that “current cannabis legislation is a total failure. Worse still, it is counter-productive: consumption has never been so widespread, the toxicity of the products so high, violence and trafficking so entrenched in our neighborhoods, and the costs generated by prohibition so staggering. Even the UN has changed its approach to drugs. It's time to face up to our responsibilities and move from repression to regulation of the production, sale and consumption of cannabis in our country”.

En marche: Emmanuel Macron - undecided

The former Minister of the Economy, Industry and the Digital Economy gave a Norman answer on the subject. On the one hand, Emmanuel Macron mentions that “cannabis poses a problem of insecurity, of links with delinquency in difficult neighborhoods, of the financing of hidden networks, and so we can see that the legalization of cannabis has interests from this point of view, and has a form of effectiveness”. He adds, “when you look at the inability of magistrates to deal with the problem from a criminal point of view, you can see that we're in a very hypocritical system”. On the other hand, he adds, ‘I'm aware of the public health concerns that have been expressed, and this is not a light subject, so I hope we can open up the subject and tackle it methodically. But I'm not against it in the interests of equality and justice”.

MoDem: François Bayrou - rather against

Undeclared candidate, for the moment, François Bayrou supports Alain Juppé but is thinking of running anyway if Nicolas Sarkozy wins the LR primaries. Okay, it's a bit complicated, but basically he's not a candidate at the moment, but reserves the right to run if the person he supports doesn't make it...

His position is rather against, without being totally closed. He recently said, “I'm not closed to the idea, but I believe that legalization would increase consumption”. To «reduce the scourge» of drugs, we need to rethink the way we fight against them. In any case, «public health» must be «the guiding principle in this matter». The results of decriminalization experiments in neighboring countries should be taken into account.