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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: Army softens drugs rule in drive to boost recruitment
Andy McSmith and Sarah Womack The Telegraph
Monday 19 Mar 2001 THE Army is planning to relax its iron rule against drug taking to ease a shortage of recruits. It is also expected to open its doors to young men with convictions for minor offences such as shoplifting, who are barred from joining at present. More than 2,300 soldiers have been discharged since drug testing was introduced six years ago. Soon trainees who test positive will face disciplinary hearings rather than expulsion. The Ministry of Defence says the Army must take a hard line because its personnel handle expensive and potentially lethal equipment. But a major recruitment review, which is nearing completion, recommends that teenage recruits found to have been using recreational drugs off duty should be given a second chance. Geoff Hoon, the Defence Secretary, is believed to back the recommendations. A senior source said: "The Armed Forces recruit from a wide range of social backgrounds and, as drug taking becomes more common in society, that will have its effect on who the Army can take on. It is a fact that drug taking is endemic in society. "At the moment, if people are taking drugs, we cannot accept them. We take people on, they go through eight weeks of intensive training and then are sent home on weekend leave. When they come back they are randomly tested and many have to leave." The number being discharged over drugs is growing: 580 in the first 10 months of last year, compared with 485 in 1999. More than 390,000 drug tests have been carried out since 1995. Just over half of one per cent have been positive, which the ministry says would compare well with any other employer testing on that scale. Last month 18 soldiers from the 1st Bn the King's Regiment were found with traces of drugs during tests at Weeton, Lancs. The battalion, which served in Northern Ireland and has Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother as its Colonel in Chief, expelled 12 soldiers last year for drug taking. Fifteen members of the Light Dragoons were dismissed in January after testing positively for ecstasy and cannabis. The Argyll and Sunderland Highlanders expelled 20 soldiers late last year. The first known case of an officer failing a drugs test was a second lieutenant in the Royal Army Medical Corps. He was allowed to resign after a random urine test indicated cannabis. Relaxation of the rules on drugs will be opposed by the Conservatives because of the potential impact on discipline. Iain Duncan Smith, the shadow defence secretary, said: "I don't believe this has anything to do with recruitment. I sense it is to do with the European Convention on Human Rights and the possibility of a challenge. "Soldiers will always take you to the wire. If they find out that it is not an automatically dismissable offence, a lot of them will say, 'I've got a free pass on this one'."
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