Subj: Cannabis Campaign - How reason helped break the taboo

Date: Mar 29, 1998

Source: Independent on Sunday

How reason helped break the taboo

From Graham Ball

The events in Hyde Park yesterday have already passed into history.
Curators from the City of London Museum were on hand throughout the day
to photograph the march and collect ephemera for the capital's official
archive.

But how did the Independent on Sunday's campaign to
decriminalise cannabis come to make history?

Three factors are responsible for propelling the campaign so
far. Firstly the support of readers who recognised the flaws in
the outdated and confused arguments deployed by those who
want to carry on treating cannabis as a dangerous drug, such
as heroin, which must be controlled by the strict application of
the criminal law.

Secondly the way in which the debate was so enthusiastically
taken up by other elements of the media.

Thirdly the persistence of Rosie Boycott, the editor, who
identified a faint pulse in an issue that many had believed to
have been long dead.

Prior to yesterday people had not taken to the streets of London in
support of cannabis law reform for 30 years. Now they have sent an
unmistakable message to the Government and broken the taboo that has
obscured this issue for so long.

It is ironic that outside the efforts of the Independent on
Sunday, the single most effective event in spreading
awareness of the need for a new approach to cannabis should
come courtesy of the household of the Home Secretary, Jack
Straw.

Mr Straw, who has implacably refused to sanction open
debate on the subject of decriminalising cannabis, found
himself at the sharp end of the argument last Christmas, when
his son, William, a 17-year-old sixth-former, was enticed into
supplying a small amount of the drug to a tabloid reporter.

Here was the proof that cannabis use is now virtually
ubiquitous, that otherwise respectable law-abiding people
share the habit. To prosecute, convict and blight a young life
for such a minor misdemeanor would be excessive.

Throughout the campaign our own and other opinion polls have
recorded a slow but steady shift towards acceptance of the
idea of decriminalising cannabis.

A poll last month of the 243 MPs elected to Parliament for the
first time last May showed 65 per cent were in favour of a
royal commission being set up to consider drugs and the law.