Britain Debates Drug Reform

[snooch]

An interesting article, and would be interesting to see what impact any possible reform in the UK would have here.

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/sep/18/police-chief-decriminalise-cannabis

 

 

Police chief issues call to decriminalise cannabis and redirect resources

Mark Townsend, home affairs editor

guardian.co.uk, Saturday 18 September 2010 22.03 BST

 

One of Britain's most senior police officers has proposed decriminalising the personal use of drugs such as cannabis to allow more resources to be dedicated to tackling high-level dealers.

 

Tim Hollis, chief constable of Humberside police, said the criminal justice system could offer only a "limited" solution to the UK's drug problem, a tacit admission that prohibition has failed.

 

Hollis's dramatic intervention comes as the government is reviewing its 10-year drug strategy amid growing warnings from experts that prohibition does not deter drug use and that decriminalisation would liberate precious police resources and cut crime.

 

Hollis, chairman of the Association of Chief Police Officers' drugs committee, said he did not want to criminalise young people caught with minor amounts of substances such as cannabis. A criminal record that could ruin their career before it began was disproportionate, he said.

 

Hollis said budget cuts had forced police to "prioritise" resources towards tackling organised criminal networks rather than individuals carrying drugs for personal use. He also backed calls for the current drug classification system into class A, B and C to be re-examined following concerns that bracketing substances such as heroin and ecstasy in the same class is confusing.

 

"We would rather invest our time in getting high-level criminals before the courts, taking money off them and removing their illicit gains rather than targeting young people. We don't want to criminalise young people because, put bluntly, if we arrest young kids for possession of cannabis and put them before the courts we know what the outcome's going to be, so actually it's perfectly reasonable to give them words of advice or take it off them."

 

Hollis said financial constraints meant it was impractical to arrest everybody caught with new designer drugs available online and added that a debate was needed over whether alcohol and nicotine, which together kill more than 120,000 people a year, should be included in attempts to tackle illegal drugs.

 

"My personal belief in terms of sheer scale of harm is that one of the most dangerous drugs in this country is alcohol. Alcohol is a lawful drug. Likewise, nicotine is a lawful drug, but cigarettes can kill," he said. "There is a wider debate on the impacts to our community about all aspects of drugs, of which illicit drugs are one modest part."

 

The comments by Hollis come as a row continues between scientists and politicians over cannabis. One of Britain's leading researchers into the drug, Professor Roger Pertwee, argued last week that policymakers should consider allowing the licensed sale of cannabis for recreational use, claiming the current policy of criminalising cannabis was ineffective.

 

Both David Cameron and Nick Clegg are on record as questioning the effectiveness of Britain's drug laws.

 

Officially the Home Office insists decriminalisation is not the right approach and there is clear evidence cannabis can damage mental health. Insiders, however, have told the Observer that officials are looking at "non-prosecution" strategies. The government has recently studied Portugal's approach in which the authorities have discreetly decriminalised the use and possession of substances including heroin.

[Fibrofeend]

This is good news. At least they are talking about it over there.

Great to see people that are currently in high profile positions speaking out about it.

 

They stil like to spout the same old line dont they " Officially the Home Office insists decriminalisation is not the right approach and there is clear evidence cannabis can damage mental health"

 

It will send everyone MAD if we dont make criminals out of them!

The right approach would be information, licensing and regulation

[spannernuts]

yep,the sooner they wake up the better.yes there will always be hardliners against legalisation.there is too much money been made the way it is now,the question is whos the bigboy dealers.that big boy mexican,the billion dollar dealer was quoted saying .prohibition is good for business.

[headstone]

This economic crisis we are in sure is great. Police no longer have the funding to go after victimless drug users and are now calling for an end to prohibition so they can go after real criminals

 

All we need to do now is hope that prop 19 passes, is a major success and that Britain follows suit. It wont take long for our brown nosed politicians to follow in their footsteps and once Australia, Britain and the USA have all "freed the weed" the rest of the world is bound to do the same

[Sylar420]

It seems every country is reconsidering the legal state of cannabis but AUSTRALIA wtf is going on? how stupid are our pollies? we have the highest cannabis use than any other developed nation yet we haven't heard head nor tail of drug reform hear, i think its sad but good on the Brits for tackling the issue