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UK: I Smoked Pot Admits MSP
Clydebank Post
Wednesday 01 Aug 2007 CLYDEBANK MSP Des McNulty has admitted to smoking cannabis. His pot puffing confession comes as a debate rages over whether penalties for people caught using the drug should be more serious. Other high profile MPs and MSPs have also revealed they experimented with hash during their youth. When asked by the Post if he had dabbled, Mr McNulty admitted that he had “tried it, but didn’t like it” during his time at university in the 1970s. Mr McNulty — Shadow Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change — said that “quite a lot” of students from that era had sampled pot and he joined in. He told the Post: “I tried it, but I didn’t like it. “In reality if you were a student at the time I was, quite a lot of people did try it. “My view was I didn’t like.” The class C drug is widely used in Clydebank and the surrounding areas — often by teenagers — with police encountering offenders almost daily. But with stronger strains of the drug now available it has resulted in calls for cannabis to be reclassified as a class B drug due to worries over a link to mental illness. A new report — by Dr Stanley Zammit and his team from Bristol and Cardiff Universities — last week revealed that users of cannabis could be 40 per cent more likely to suffer a psychotic illness such as schizophrenia — although they admitted the risk still remained low. A Government-led consultation will take place looking at reclassifying the drug, after it was downgraded from class B in 2004. This has led to a number of politicians admitting to having first-hand knowledge of the drug. Nine top-ranked Labour politicians have admitted experimenting, including Deputy Leader Harriet Harman, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith — who is looking into reclassification — and Chancellor Alistair Darling. And a number of SNP politicians, including Deputy Leader Nicola Sturgeon and MSPs Fergus Ewing and Fiona Hyslop, admitted to ‘dabbling’ in the drug. Clydebank MP John McFall went on the record to say he had never smoked pot. Donnie McGilveray, project manager with Clydebank drug treatment centre Alternatives, said he welcomes the debate. He told the Post: “I think the general public might be quite sceptical of every politician trying cannabis and never liking it. “It’s more to do with peer pressure. “Drugs are part of growing up — alcohol are drugs, cigarettes are drugs. “I do welcome politicians beginning to speak of it more openly. “There is a misperception that to take drugs means you must be an evil or weak person. “I certainly hope there isn’t a move that they tried it once therefore they are experts on cannabis.” Mr McGilveray added that the class C drug comes in as many as 50 different varieties depending on which part of the plant it comes from and the danger often depends on how it is being used. He said that some users of the drug have demonstrated schizophrenia in the past but argued there was no clear line to show if it was predominant before or if the drug brought it out. Mr McGilveray added that instead of the Government looking to reclassify the drug they should consider investing more money in rehabilitation programmes. http://www.clydebankpost.co.uk/?module=displaystory&story_id=979&format=html
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