Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

I can advise the senator that it is actually not more restrictive than what applied before the enactment of the Narcotic Drugs Amendment Act that we brought in last year. It is actually consistent with the pathways that were available prior to that legislation, when cannabis was a schedule 9 product. So it is not actually more restrictive; it is actually consistent with the previously existing pathways, and that was our policy—that the product be available under the pathways that were in place at the time. There is no new prohibition. The changes to the Therapeutic Goods Regulations were necessary to maintain the agreed level of regulation and oversight, as per the government's announcement.