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UK: 'I'll still open my cannabis cafe'

The BBC

Monday 11 Nov 2002

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A man who plans to set up a cannabis cafe says a report warning of the
serious health dangers of the drug will not stop him pressing ahead with
his plans.

Kevin Williamson, of the counter-culture activist group and publishing
house Rebel Inc, plans to challenge the existing law by opening a cafe in
Edinburgh where cannabis usage will be tolerated - and where eventually the
drug will be put on sale.

He said a British Lung Foundation report suggesting that cannabis is every
bit as harmful as smoking tobacco does nothing to make him think twice.

"This makes me more determined to actually go through with this," he told
the BBC.

"None of the health reports on cannabis affect any of the primary reasons
for taking cannabis out of the black market, namely to separate its sale
from hard drugs, to take it out of residential areas, to take it out of the
hands of the criminal black market and to end the criminalisation of users."

Dishonesty

Mr Williamson said there was a danger that the BLF report could be
dishonestly hijacked by people who were opposed to decriminalisation of
cannabis.

"If cannabis is proven to be slightly harmful then it makes sense to take
it out of the black market."

Although the law on cannabis has recently been softened, it is still
illegal both to possess and sell the drug.

Mr Williamson said: "We intend to challenge that law by showing that you
can actually put cannabis on sale or have it consumed in a place where you
can keep hard drugs out, where you can keep under age people out of the
premises, and where it does not lead to any social disorder."

Health risks

Dame Helena Shovelton, chief executive of the British Lung Foundation, said
150,000 a year died from lung disease.

"We are not trying to say smoke or don't smoke cannabis.

"We are saying if you do, understand the risks that are invovled in doing
so, and don't have the same situation which we had with tobacco, which was
years of denial about the problems."

 

 

 

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