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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: No longer any point in banning harmful drugs, says campaigner (Danny Kushlick)
Bristol Post Tuesday 10 Jul 2012 Danny Kushlick said there was no longer any point in banning harmful drugs, saying a prescription approach should be adopted instead. But his proposals were branded "grossly irresponsible" during a grilling by the Home Affairs Select Committee at Westminster yesterday. Mr Kushlick is the head of external affairs at the Transform Drug Policy Foundation, based in King Street in the city centre. The think tank believes drug prohibition has failed and should be replaced by government control and regulation. Mr Kushlick was giving evidence to the Home Affairs committee, which is investigating alternatives to drug policy and the issues faced by the police. He told the MPs the current model of prohibition costs £100 billion a year and did not represent "value for money". He claimed that intensifying the war on drugs would be "patently stupid" and that public opinion was moving towards reform of the law. After being pressed repeatedly on which drugs he would like to see licensed, Mr Kushlick said: "Heroin, coke, ecstasy, cannabis – all the ones which have a high level of demand." In a bad-tempered exchange, Tory committee member Michael Ellis attacked Mr Kushlick, who said he had focused on drug-users, rather than victims of drug-related crime. Mr Ellis asked: "Have you taken the trouble to speak to victims of crime? "I am going to make it clear to you, for the absence of any ambiguity. I think your position is grossly irresponsible." Mr Kushlick said re-offending rates had been slashed in countries that had tried a prescription approach to heroin. The exchange came a week after Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke said that the UK was "plainly losing" the war on drugs. Mr Clarke said little progress had been made in the past 30 years in tackling the country's biggest cause of crime and that things might be "going backwards" – but said he opposed decriminalisation. http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/longer-point-banning-harmful-drugs-says/story-16514486-detail/story.html
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