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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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Column: The 'clause four' of the Tory party must be the legalisation of cannabis
Times, The
Wednesday 27 Jun 2001 Author: Mary Ann Sieghart The 'clause four' of the Tory party must be the legalisation of cannabis. Liberalism on drugs chimes with Conservative values Tony Blair understood it. So does Michael Portillo. An unpopular party not only has to ditch its leader. It also needs a symbolic break from the past. This shows voters that the party understands how the world has changed. The Conservatives, in short, need their own Clause Four. It will have to be a tenet that the more right-wing members relinquish only with reluctance. Otherwise the reform is not radical enough. The new Tory leader needs to be seen to be taking on the reactionaries in his party, just as Blair did. It should also be an issue that appeals to younger activists, even if it dismays the older ones. Could it be marriage? Before the election, some politicians were suggesting this was the Tory totem that had to go. But marriage is so self-evidently a social good; and it would be odd to stop supporting the institution only a few years after new Labour - or the Prime Minister and Home Secretary, at least - have come round to it. No, the answer is clear. The Conservatives' "clause four" must be the legalisation of cannabis. If this were to become Tory policy, boy, would it show that the party had changed. Remember Ann Widdecombe's lunatic "zero tolerance" speech at Bournemouth last year? If anyone had any doubt that the Tories were out of touch, here was the evidence. Her policy would instantly have criminalised not only the vandals on the sink estates, but well-educated professionals and their children - even, as it turned out, half the Shadow Cabinet. You might have thought her hardline stance would have appealed at least to the Tory faithful. There were many in the conference hall who cheered. But the reaction outside showed just how much middle England had changed. Even the party's house organ, the Daily Telegraph, described Widdecombe as displaying "zero common sense". Indeed, the Telegraph ran a courageous editorial supporting the Police Foundation's line on decriminalisation of cannabis. For liberalism on drugs - particularly soft drugs - actually chimes with many Conservative values. There is the issue of personal freedom against an oppressive and intrusive State. Conservatives ought to believe in people being able to get on with their life in peace as long as they don't harm others. Tories believe too in reducing crime. It's not just that legalising cannabis would, by definition, cut crime; it would also take millions of pounds out of the pockets of organised criminals, and redistribute the money between legitimate private enterprise and, through excise duties, the State. Then there is respect for the law. This is a statute that has otherwise law-abiding people dodging the police, forced to seek out shady dealers, fearing for their reputation. It turns respectable people against the forces of criminal justice. But, more to the point, think what this change would do for the Conservative Party. It would allow a new leader to outflank Tony Blair, who has been uncommonly pusillanimous on the question of drugs. And it would make the Tories instantly seem more up-ti-date, more in touch with modern Britain, than Labour. Best of all, it would allow the Conservatives once again to appeal to the young. No party comes back to power until it is seen as the coming thing. Under William Hague, the Tories seemed to pride themselves on their reactionary, 1950s-era values, which were fine for attracting a dwindling band of over-65s, but not much use for the generations below. Cannabis legalisation, at a stroke, could make the Tories seem exciting again. Few young people these days want to be associated with Labour. Go round the universities and you find students joining the Greens, the Socialist Alliance or the Liberal Democrats. Blair and his lot represent the Establishment, to be despised, not supported. A dynamic, libertarian new Conservative Party might regain the edge that it possessed, in a different way, during the 1980s. Who knows? It might even become cool to vote Tory again. Now that would be a start.
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