Malta doctors push to scrap zero-tolerance cannabis driving rule: ‘We’re jailing yesterday’s joint’

Doctors, FSWS want cannabis driving limits instead of zero tolerance
—————————————————————
By [Hot Malta Staff] | 09 June 2025, 07:30 CEST

A white Toyota C-HR crawls along the Sliema front at 2 a.m., L-plates still gleaming. Inside, 22-year-old *“Luke”*—not his real name—hasn’t touched a joint for 14 hours, but the blood test at the roadside still screams “positive”. His licence is gone on the spot, his summer job as a delivery driver evaporates with it, and the court date looms like a summer storm over Valletta’s Grand Harbour.

Luke is the human face of Malta’s zero-tolerance drug-driving rule, a law that treats any detectable trace of THC—the psychoactive component of cannabis—the same as driving blind drunk. Now the country’s largest medical union, the Malta Medical Association (MMA), and the Foundation for Social Welfare Services (FSWS) are publicly calling for a science-based THC limit instead of the current “not one molecule” regime. The shift, they argue, would bring Malta in line with Germany, Luxembourg and—crucially—keep otherwise law-abiding adults out of jail while still punishing those who are actually impaired.

### “We’re criminalising yesterday’s joint”
Dr. Daniela Cassar, a forensic toxicologist at Mater Dei, pulls up a colour-coded chart on her office wall. “THC-COOH, the non-impairing metabolite, can linger 30 days in chronic users,” she says, tapping a bar that stretches well past the legal cutoff. “Our current test doesn’t ask ‘is this person high?’ It asks ‘did this person consume within the last lunar cycle?’ That’s not road safety; that’s moral policing.”

The numbers back her up. Transport Malta statistics show 1,180 licence suspensions for drug-driving in 2024, a 42 % jump since 2022. Of those, 68 % involved only cannabis, and 54 % were drivers under 30. “We’re losing young workers, students, parents—people who’d rather take the bus than risk a pint, but who smoked a spliff at last weekend’s village *festa*,” says FSWS director Bernard Pace.

### Culture clash on the *festa* steps
Malta’s relationship with cannabis has always been a tug-of-war between Mediterranean laissez-faire and Catholic conservatism. Since Labour legalised possession of up to 7 g for personal use in 2021, grow clubs have sprouted from Birkirkara to Gżira, yet the traffic code remained frozen in 2010. The result is a legal paradox: you can legally carry weed home on the bus, but the moment you sit behind the wheel days later, you’re a “drug driver”.

At the Żejtun parish *festa*, 67-year-old *“Nannu Ġużeppi”* waves a *ħelu* candy floss bigger than his head. “In my day we drove after three *Kinnie* and a nap—now these kids lose their licence for a puff?” he shrugs. But across the square, 19-year-old student Mireille argues the reform doesn’t go far enough. “I don’t even smoke, but my boyfriend lost his job because he tested positive five days after a joint. How is that protecting anyone?”

### What would a limit look like?
The MMA proposes adopting the German model: 3.5 ng/ml of active THC in whole blood as the “per se” limit, with graduated penalties up to 7 ng/ml and automatic impairment assessment above that. The science is hardly radical; the same cut-off is used by the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and endorsed by the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs.

Critics warn any threshold sends the wrong message. “Cannoid limits give a false sense of safety,” says Nationalist MP Claudette Buttigieg. “Unlike alcohol, THC affects everyone differently.” But Dr. Cassar counters that the same argument once delayed seat-belt laws. “We don’t ban seat belts because some people still die wearing them. We set evidence-based standards and educate.”

### Economic ripple effects
Beyond the courtroom, the zero-tolerance rule is denting Malta’s gig economy. Food-delivery platforms complain of driver shortages; tourism operators report cancelled jeep tours after casual workers fail surprise tests. “We had a German couple stranded in Gozo because their guide lost his licence over a joint he smoked in Berlin the week before,” says Thomas Vella, who runs a small tour firm. “That’s not the Malta brand we want to export.”

### The road ahead
Parliamentary Secretary for Transport Rebecca Buttigieg told *Hot Malta* that a White Paper on drug-driving reform will be published “before summer recess”, opening a six-week public consultation. Sources close to the talks say the 3.5 ng/ml figure is “on the table”, alongside roadside saliva-testing kits that screen for active THC only—devices already piloted discreetly along the Coast Road last April.

For Luke, change can’t come soon enough. He’s now cycling the 12 km from Msida to his new waiter job in St Julian’s, pedalling past billboards that still warn “*Trid tixrob u ssuq? Tista’ tispiċċa l-ħabs*” (“Drink and drive? You could end up in jail”). “Maybe one day they’ll add: ‘Smoke responsibly—wait six hours, not six weeks’,” he laughs, wiping sweat from his brow.

Until then, Malta’s roads remain a zero-tolerance maze where yesterday’s *festa* chill can become tomorrow’s criminal record. Doctors, social workers and an entire generation of drivers are asking: isn’t it time the law caught up with the science, and with the island’s own, newly relaxed attitude to weed?