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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: Labour MP to call for cannabis legalisation Matthew Tempest The Guardian Wednesday 18 Jul 2001 A Labour backbencher sacked by Tony Blair is due to bring in a private bill to legalise cannabis by the end of the year. Jon Owen Jones, a former whip and junior Welsh office minister, has cross-party support for his plan, which will highlight the divisions between liberals and authoritarians within the Labour party. The home secretary David Blunkett has called for an "adult debate" on the legal status of soft drugs, but critics fear the government is stonewalling whilst public support for a rethink is ignored. Mr Jones, who revealed last year he had both smoked marijuana and enjoyed it as a young man, said: "This is a call for legalisation, not just decriminalisation, because that option leaves open too many dichotomies. "The UK has the most coercive laws in Europe on cannabis, yet the highest usage. It is time to acknowledge the war on drugs is just not winnable." The MP, who's Cardiff Central constituency includes a high proportion of University students, said his mind was made up to use his private members bill to call for cannabis legalisation after seeing the film Traffic. That movie shows how billions of dollars worth of US law enforcement merely reduces the competition for the drugs barons, rather than stamping out the consumption. Mr Jones added: "When I was a young man smoking cannabis I thought politicians who wanted to keep it illegal were hypocritical but naive. "Now, with everyone either knowing someone who's used cannabis, or used it themselves, I just think young people will see politicians as simply hypocritical." The first reading of the bill will take place today, although a full debate is not scheduled until October or November. As a private members bill it stands little chance of becoming law, but is bound to reopen the ongoing debate over the state's attitude to soft and hard drugs. Belgium recently joined Denmark, Portugal and the Netherlands in effectively decriminalising personal possession of cannabis. In Britain unlikely allies of the 'Legalise It' movement of the 1960s have come in the form of Conservative MPs Peter Lilley and Alan Duncan, as well as more traditional campaigners within Labour and Liberal Democrat ranks. Mr Jones added: "Now is not the time for specifying the fine detail of sales points and retail, but the purpose of legalisation as opposed to decriminalisation is to iron out the wrinkle in the law regarding who supplies the retailers. "It would also be a major factor in cutting the emerging gun culture in this country, which is fuelled by the violence of street drug dealers protecting their patches."
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