What is most appropriate will depend upon what goals both policy makers and the community are seeking to achieve. Our review suggests that two of the five legislative options discussed in Chapter 4 are inappropriate in contemporary Australian circumstances. They are the options which we have characterised as 'total prohibition' and 'free availability'. The arguments for rejecting these options will not be repeated here as they are detailed in Chapter 4 . Australian society experiences more harm, we conclude, from maintaining the prohibition policy than it experiences from the use of the drug.
Widespread interest exists in the Dutch approach to drug policies.
We have categorised them, in this paper, under the heading of total prohibition, as that is the Dutch legislative position. The regulatory option is one of the approaches which we suggest is more appropriate to Australian circumstances than is total prohibition. It could be argued that the Dutch approach is a product of a different culture and system of administration of criminal justice. If the Australian States and Territories resolve not to arrest and proceed against people using, possessing or supplying cannabis, by far the best approach is for this policy to be implemented through legislation, rather than through an administrative decision not to prosecute cannabis offenders. This is because the Australian system of legal justice is based upon the principle of legal clarity and consistency in the implementation of the law.