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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: The Government must be on drugs
Tom Utley The Telegraph
Friday 02 Dec 2005 The Government must be on drugs I can only assume that Tony Blair has been passing spliffs around the Cabinet table. Nothing else properly explains the extraordinary confusion of his administration's thinking on drink and drugs. When the Prime Minister came to power, he promised us "joined-up government". Instead, he has come up with a psychedelic mix of policies, sending out conflicting signals that could only make sense to a hippy on his fifth joint. Imagine the conversation in the Cabinet room at Number 10, as the ministerial reefer passes to the Home Secretary. Charles Clarke: "Hey, man, isn't it, like, a real bummer that so many kids get smashed out of their brains down the boozer on a Saturday night?" Tony Blair: "Yeah, Chazza, too right. All that violence and, like, throwing up in the street. What do you say we launch, like, a mega-crackdown on binge drinking?" CC (taking another puff): "Great idea, Tony. And another thing. Wouldn't it be, like, totally awesome if we let pubs stay open all day and all night? Then kids could get smashed out of their brains and, like, throw up in the street and whaddever at four o'clock in the morning." TB (giggling inanely as the cannabis takes its effect): "So that's agreed, then. We'll crack down on drinking and keep the pubs open 24 hours a day." Yesterday, the Transport Secretary added to the confusion when he launched his department's annual crusade against drink-driving. Alistair Darling's sermon for this year, as the pubs are preparing for a Christmas bonanza with their newly extended licences, is that motorists shouldn't drink a single drop of alcohol if they are planning to drive during what used to be the festive season. He chose to go to a pub, of all places, to launch his campaign - not a real pub, of course, because Labour has become increasingly detached from the real world over the past eight years. The pub he picked was the Rovers Return, on the set of Coronation Street, where he ordered a glass of orange juice from the actress Sally Lindsay. Does he honestly believe that drivers will follow his example over Christmas, and tell each other in the early hours of the morning: "Let's go down to the all-night boozer. I could really murder an orange juice"? But if the Government is sending out mixed messages about drink, then what about drugs? Nobody has ever managed to explain to me satisfactorily the reasoning behind David Blunkett's extraordinary decision, when he was home secretary last year, to relax the penalties for possessing cannabis, while at the very same moment announcing stiffer sentences for selling it. I confess that I myself have been in two minds about drugs for many years. The liberal in me says that most of the harm done to innocent third parties by narcotics springs from their illegality. If cannabis, cocaine and the rest were decriminalised, then the price of them would come crashing down. That, in turn, would mean that fewer addicts would be driven to prostitution, mugging or burglary to feed their habit. It would also help to put the murderous gangs who control the trade, in Jamaica and elsewhere, out of business. But then the father in me says that I couldn't bear it if any of my four sons became hooked on drugs. It is simply not true that drug-abusers harm only themselves. They hurt everyone who loves them, too. Mr Blunkett's policy satisfied neither the liberal nor the father in me. It struck me as completely bonkers. By relaxing the penalties for possessing cannabis, he stimulated demand for the drug. But at the same time, he suppressed supply by cracking down harder than ever on the people who sold it. You don't need a degree in economics to understand that when you stimulate the demand for any commodity, while suppressing its supply, you drive up its price. That applies as much to cannabis and cocaine as it does to petrol and potatoes. And the higher the price of these drugs, of course, the more likely are their abusers to turn to crime in order to finance their habit. As if Mr Blunkett's initiative weren't mad enough, his successor has now added another layer of lunacy to the Government's drugs policy. On Wednesday, Mr Clarke announced plans to issue specific guidance on the amount of drugs that anybody may carry before being assumed by the authorities to be a dealer, rather than merely a possessor. For example, anybody caught with less than 4oz of cannabis will be assumed to be carrying it for his own use. He will either be let off with a warning, or charged with the minor crime of possession. More than 4oz, however, and he will be deemed to be a dealer, and almost certainly locked up. Now, I am no expert in these matters, and I have to rely on the papers to tell me how much cannabis resin is a lot, and how much is a little. According to yesterday's Daily Telegraph, 4oz is enough to roll about 512 "light joints", or 256 "strong" ones. The Daily Mail, on the other hand, estimates that 4oz is enough for 810 joints. All I can deduce from this is that, when it comes to rolling joints, the Telegraph's experts are much more generous with their dope than the Mail's. What is quite clear, however, is that 4oz is a heck of a lot, with a street price of somewhere between £200 and £440. The price of 17oz of cannabis leaf - the upper limit suggested by Mr Clarke for those who wish to escape a charge of drug-dealing, and enough for more than 2,000 joints - is said to be more than £1,500. Are we really supposed to believe that people carry this much with them for their personal use? The Government's message, in short, seems to be this: 1) don't worry if you are caught with cannabis for your own use, because that isn't a crime worth bothering about; 2) worry like hell if you are caught selling cannabis, because we will send you to prison for it; but 3) if you really must sell cannabis, don't carry more than a year's supply around with you, so that we can all pretend that you are not really selling it after all. "Joined-up government?" Jointed up, more like.
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