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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: Cannabis reclassified: what the papers said Dan Matlin The Observer Sunday 14 Jul 2002 Last Wednesday the Home Secretary, David Blunkett, announced both that the government intends to reclassify cannabis from a class B to a class C drug and that the maximum sentence for dealing class C drugs will be raised to 14 years. Here's a selection of the press reaction "Mr Blunkett is an ideological version of one of those hermaphroditic parrotfish. One day he feels the jackboot forming invisibly round his shins; the next day he seems to want to freak out and wear flowers in his hair. Labour can't work out whether it is libertarian, authoritarian, vegetarian or Rotarian. There is no Third Way with cannabis. You can't suck and blow at the same time - with or without inhaling" - Boris Johnson, Daily Telegraph, 11 July "This is the biggest gamble that New Labour has taken and I back it to the hilt. Please God that they have got it right. If they have not, our children will drown in a tide of drug addiction... These are genuinely earth-shaking events, raising questions about how we live our lives... We have to think about how best to create a free society for our kids. Blunkett never looked like a politician who would do that. Yesterday, he proved me wrong" - Paul Routledge, The Mirror, 11 July "The drug experiment in London's Lambeth is an utter failure. Dealers rule the roost. Drugs of all kinds are sold openly. And all this because Commander Brian Paddick of the Metropolitan Police was allowed to start a stupid experiment. Now the Home Secretary is taking one of the biggest risks of his career ... Yesterday's announcement proves one thing, though. David Blunkett's got guts. He doesn't do things by halves... " - The Sun, editorial, 11 July "David Blunkett's statement to the Commons yesterday was far more than just a reclassification of cannabis... There are two other attractive parts of the policy: an increase in treatment facilities and an expanded heroin prescribing programme, moving the addiction from a criminal offence to a medical need, an old and sensible approach. Traditionally, our drug policy has been hopelessly lopsided, spending 75% on enforcement (which does not work) and only 13% on treatment (which does)... Now a further £183m over three years will be invested. The balance will still not be right, but the move is in the right direction". - The Guardian, editorial, 11 July "[Smoking cannabis] is not an admirable habit but it should be treated proportionately. It is in the interests of public and police alike to make a firmer distinction between those drugs that render people their slaves and others that satisfy a relatively harmless personal thrill. The Class C position, which permits the police to confiscate cannabis and give warnings, is sound... [However, Blunkett's] proposal to raise the maximum sentence for those dealing Class C drugs to 14 years' imprisonment, the same as that for Class B drugs, looks like an attempt to cover his back politically. It means, to put it crudely, that there is no incentive for a dealer to specialise in cannabis and abandon amphetamines" - The Times, editorial, 11 July "[Blunkett] seems unduly keen on allowing the police virtually all their old powers of confiscation. So much so, in fact, that special laws will have to be passed to make blowing dope smoke at a policeman an offence... And by insisting that 'all drugs are harmful', with the clear implication that all drugs are equally harmful, Mr Blunkett leaves himself open to ridicule ... The Government's policy on drugs has become more befuddled than the most dedicated afficionado of skunk" - The Independent, editorial, 11 July "Drugs are a part of life for millions of young people - and a lot who are not so young. So easing the law on cannabis is not so much an earth-shattering breakthrough as a small step towards a more sensible policy. It will mean that a huge number of people are no longer criminals simply because they smoke a joint. So far, so good. But there is a long way to go if the real menace of drugs is to be properly tackled, and David Blunkett... refuses to move further ... There can only be one possible result of that: the drugs crisis will get worse" - Daily Mirror, editorial, 11 July
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