New Mandatory Minimum Sentences for Serious Drug Offences in Canada

Last reviewed and updated 30 August 2026.

There are no longer any mandatory minimum sentences for drug offences in Canada. Bill C-5 repealed all of them from the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act on 17 November 2022, including the minimums the Supreme Court of Canada had already struck down as unconstitutional in R. v. Lloyd.

This page explains what those minimums were, why they were removed, and what a court now considers when sentencing a drug offence — because the repeal returns sentencing to the judge’s discretion rather than eliminating the risk of a jail sentence.

What applies now

A drug offence is sentenced on ordinary principles: the gravity of the offence, the offender’s degree of responsibility, and the circumstances of both. A jail sentence remains a realistic outcome in serious trafficking, importing and production cases. What has changed is that the judge is no longer required to impose a fixed floor regardless of the circumstances, and conditional sentences are available again in cases where they previously were not.

The repealed scheme, 2012 to 2022

The material below is kept as a record of the scheme introduced by the Safe Streets & Communities Act in 2012 and repealed in 2022. It no longer states the law.

Serious drug offences include production; trafficking; possession for the purpose of trafficking; importing and exporting; and possession for the purpose of exporting drugs listed in Schedule I, such as heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine. Cannabis was then listed in Schedule II; it was removed from the CDSA altogether when the Cannabis Act came into force in October 2018.

Under that scheme, a mandatory minimum applied where an aggravating factor was present, including any of the following circumstances:

• for the benefit of organized crime;
• involving use or threat of violence;
• involving use or threat of use of weapons;
• by someone who has been previously convicted (in the past 10 years) of a serious drug offence;
• in a prison;
• by abusing a position of authority or access to restricted areas;
• in or near a school, in or near an area normally frequented by youth or in the presence of youth;
• through involving a youth in the commission of the offence; and
• in relation to a youth (e.g. selling to a youth).

Some offences, such as producing or importing a Schedule I substance, carried a minimum whether or not an aggravating factor was present, and cultivating more than five cannabis plants did the same. None of those minimums survives: Bill C-5 removed every one of them in November 2022.

Mandatory minimums for drug offences no longer exist in Canada; everything below is a historical record of the repealed scheme.

The two charts below are retained as a historical record of how the 2012 scheme was structured. They do not state the law as it stands today.

APPENDIX A

APPENDIX B

¹ Aggravating Factors APPENDIX A

The aggravating factors were offences committed:

• for the benefit of organized crime;
• involving use or threat of violence;
• involved use or threat of use of weapons;
• by someone who was previously convicted of a designated drug offence or had served a term of imprisonment for a designated substance offence in the previous 10 years; and,
• through the abuse of authority or position or by abusing access to restricted area to commit the offence of importation/exportation and possession to export.

² Aggravating Factors APPENDIX B

The aggravating factors were offences committed:

• in a prison;
• in or near a school, in or near an area normally frequented by youth or in the presence of youth;
• in concert with a youth; and
• in relation to a youth (e.g. selling to a youth).

³ Health and Safety Factors

• the accused used real property that belongs to a third-party to commit the offence;
• the production constituted a potential security, health or safety hazard to children who were in the location where the offence was committed or in the immediate area;
• the production constituted a potential public safety hazard in a residential area; and
• the accused placed or set a trap.

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