A Reversal Of German Cannabis Legalization Is “Off The Table”

The German Cannabis Industry Association (BvCW) recently held a parliamentary evening event, at which current German Bundestag member Carmen Wegge appeared and spoke. Ms. Wegge is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) who has served in the Bundestag since 2021. At the event, Ms. Wegge reportedly indicated that abolition of the CanG law is “off the table.”

“At yesterday’s parliamentary evening of the German Cannabis Industry Association (BvCW), Carmen Wegge promised those present that the Cannabis Act would not be repealed. In return, she hoped for improvements in the right direction.” wrote Moritz Förster for Krautinvest (translated from German to English).

“Wegge emphasizes that the SPD “tirelessly” defended the Cannabis Act during the coalition negotiations. She also points to the improvements that have already been made, for example, in terms of prevention, economic development, and greater justice.” Förster stated in his original reporting.

Ms. Wegge’s comments are similar to those made by leading German cannabis policy expert attorney Peter Homberg of gunnercooke at the recent International Cannabis Business Conference in Berlin last month.

“Attorney Homberg predicts that the reversal of partial legalization and thus of the previous measures of the traffic light coalition is unlikely. The effort involved in completely reversing the partial legalization of cannabis and reclassifying cannabis as a narcotic is far too great.” reported Pharmazeutische Zeitung about Mr. Homberg’s presentation at the conference in Berlin.

“And of course, you would need a clear majority, not only in Parliament, but also in the Federal Council.” Homberg stated about a potential reversal. “It’s very difficult to put the genie back in the bottle. Who’s going to monitor this now?”

Leading up to the last German federal election, domestic politicians opposed to modernized cannabis policies expressed a strong desire to completely reverse the CanG legalization measure. However, last month, the new governing coalition announced that, at least for the time being, there would be no changes made to Germany’s cannabis policies, and the CanG law would remain in place as is.

Part of the statements made by the governing coalition last month did involve the announcement of future evaluations, which will occur as part of the coalition agreement. The new governing coalition is expected to revisit the topic when the results of ongoing evaluations become available in Q4 2025.

A complete reversal of the German CanG law is not a popular proposal among German voters. A recent YouGov poll found that a minority (38%) of the nation’s citizens support reversing German adult-use cannabis legalization.

Additionally, according to the results of a Forsa survey commissioned by the KKH Kaufmännische Krankenkasse, 55% of surveyed Germans do not want to repeal the nation’s CanG adult-use legalization law. Only 36% of the Forsa survey respondents indicated that they want to repeal legalization, with the rest being undecided.

Various German organizations have also expressed opposition to a CanG reversal. The New Association of Judges (NRV) in Germany previously expressed a positive conclusion regarding legalization and warned newly elected German lawmakers against reversing the CanG law.

“Rolling back the law would mean that the judiciary would have to pursue small consumers on a large scale again. This would mean there would be no time to take action against organized crime.” reported Deutschlandfunk in its local coverage.

“In addition, according to the NRV, the state faces high compensation payments in the event of withdrawal. If the cultivation and consumption of cannabis were to be completely banned again, this would amount to expropriation of the cannabis clubs, it was said. This would enable the clubs to make claims for compensation against the state. The investment in cannabis cultivation is high and the licenses are valid for seven years according to the law.” the outlet also stated.

The Institute for Competition Economics at the Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf previously conducted an analysis, finding that adult-use legalization could yield as much as 1.3 billion euros per year in savings for Germany’s police and judicial system.

German pharmacist Florian Sedlmeier and other members of Germany’s pharmacy industry also publicly pushed back on the effort by cannabis opponents in Germany to reclassify cannabis as a narcotic drug in the European nation.

“Pharmacist Florian Sedlmeier warns against reclassifying medicinal cannabis as a narcotic drug (BtM). Such a step would increase the bureaucratic burden and make it more difficult to provide patients with rapid care, ” stated the German Cannabis Business Association (BvCW) in a recent newsletter, citing an article from apotheke-adhoc. “He considers the concern expressed by SPD Health Minister Clemens Hoch that medicinal cannabis can be ordered too easily online to be understandable, but stresses that pharmacies carefully check prescriptions and licenses.”