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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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I smoked pot and enjoyed it, says senior Tory Paul Waugh Reuters Monday 09 Oct 2000 LONDON (Reuters) - Another senior member of the Conservative Party said in a newspaper interview published on Tuesday that he had used cannabis in his youth. Just as the Conservatives began backtracking on a pledge to crack down heavily on soft drugs, agriculture spokesman Tim Yeo became the eighth leading figure in the party to admit having used cannabis. He told the Times he had been an occasional pot-smoker "a long way in the past". "I was offered it on occasion and enjoyed it," Yeo said. "I think it can be a much pleasanter experience than having too much to drink. I don't share the view that it was disagreeable. I found it agreeable." To add to Conservative leader William Hague's discomfort over the drugs issue, the Times reported that his former deputy Peter Lilley -- no longer a member of the front-bench team -- was preparing to publish a pamphlet setting out the case for legalising cannabis. Shadow Home Secretary Ann Widdecombe's promise last week to fine anyone caught with any quantity of cannabis swiftly unravelled when seven senior party colleagues admitted to a Sunday newspaper they had smoked the drug in the past. The admissions threw the party's drugs policy into disarray at a time when the Conservatives' fortunes appeared to be reviving. In an attempt to repair the damage Hague stepped in and diluted Widdecombe's "zero tolerance" policy. "We recognise there have been concerns about the practical implementation of the policy," he said in one of a series of television interviews on Monday. "Let's go out to the teachers, police, (doctors) and drug advisers to discuss the policy further." Widdecombe's policy was dismissed as a "backward step" by police and as "unrealistic and impracticable" by the Labour government's anti-drugs coordinator, Keith Hellawell. Widdecombe wanted 100-pound fines for first time offenders and a charge comparable to drug dealing for anyone caught with all but the smallest quantities of soft drugs. Her intervention has prompted a fresh debate on soft drugs, with calls for cannabis to be legalised. Two former police chiefs, former Gwent chief constable Francis Wilkinson and ex-Scotland Yard drug squad commander Edward Ellison entered the debate on Monday, calling for cannabis to be decriminalised to help stamp out harder drugs.
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