|
Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
|
|
UK: Tories attack Lilley's line on cannabis
Andy McSmith The Telegraph
Saturday 07 Jul 2001 LEADING Conservatives moved rapidly yesterday to disown the liberal views on cannabis expressed by Peter Lilley, the party's former deputy leader. Ann Widdecombe, the shadow home secretary, said Mr Lilley had departed from the party line in calling for the drug to be made available for sale through licensed outlets. She said: "The position of the Tory party is that there is not sufficient argument for legalising or decriminalising cannabis. Once it's done you won't be able to turn back the clock "We know there are tremendous problems associated with cigarette smoking but you can't turn back the clock. So you have to be very, very certain before you embark on a course like that." Mr Lilley argued that making the drug available legally would take the trade away from criminal gangs. But Miss Widdecombe told Sky News: "What you will actually do is encourage the big drug barons not to pack up and go home but to put all their efforts into marketing hard drugs and make their profit there." Mr Lilley's comments, in The Telegraph yesterday, came days after the start of an experiment by police in Lambeth, south London, where people found in possession of cannabis are let off with a warning. David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, has praised the south London experiment, saying the war on hard drugs is the priority. But Downing Street emphasised that the Government was not intending to make cannabis legal. The Prime Minister's spokesman said: "Cannabis is dangerous, it does cause medical problems, cancer, hallucinations. Therefore, the position has not changed. "The Government's position has always been clear, that the priority should be addressing class A drugs. Cannabis is a class B drug. So Lambeth fits in with the Government's strategy." Mr Lilley has put pressure on Michael Portillo, a contender for the Tory leadership, to declare his position on cannabis. Mr Portillo's supporters include Mr Lilley and six shadow cabinet members who declared last autumn that they had smoked cannabis when they were young. Mr Portillo has said several times the issue should be addressed but has avoided expressing a personal opinion. He said: "I think the arguments on both sides are quite finely balanced. I think they are complicated. But a Conservative Party I lead would certainly be happy to address those issues." Kenneth Clarke, a former Home Secretary running for the party leadership, told BBC News 24: "I've been to Amsterdam, where that is the policy, and to Kingston, Jamaica, where it is used by a large section of the population, and it is visible and obvious that an alternative, slightly druggy lifestyle is being lived in parts of those cities which I am not at all sure I want to see introduced to the cities of this country." David Davis, another leadership contender, did not want cannabis legalised but said the law was clearly not working and may need reform. Mike Goodman, director of Release, the drugs charity, said: "The debate has really come on in leaps and bounds in the last few months. The law on cannabis is long overdue for reform." Simon Hughes, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, told BBC Radio 4's World at One: "Everybody knows the present law is not just a nonsense but is making it very difficult to distinguish between drugs which are relatively harmless and drugs which are clearly harmful. "If you class them all as illegal you are actually not helping anybody make that distinction."
After you have finished reading this article you can click here to go back.
|
This page was created by the Cannabis Campaigners' Guide.
Feel free to link to this page!