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UK: Cannabis cafe rolls out challenge

BBC Online

Tuesday 27 Jan 2004

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Campaigners have vowed to break the law by opening a cannabis cafe in
Scotland when the drug is reclassified.

The Scottish Cannabis Coffeeshop Movement said the Purple Haze Cafe in
Edinburgh would allow use of the drug when it is downgraded next Thursday.

The reclassification means police in England and Wales will rarely arrest
people for possession of small amounts.

However, the Scottish Executive has made it clear there will be no change
in practice in Scotland.

Paul Stewart, owner of the Purple Haze, is set to test that position and
has said he will invite members of his cafe to bring their own cannabis and
smoke it on the premises.

"All we're saying is people are going to use cannabis, we have to accept
that, and if they are we're trying to give them advice and information so
that they can use it in the safest possible way.

"If I have to be criminalised for that then that's up to the police."

But the Deputy Chief Constable of Lothian and Borders Police, Tom Wood, has
warned the force will take action quickly to deal with any breach of the
law at the Purple Haze.

The move to reclassify the drug will see it downgraded from class B to
class C, along with steroids and tranquillisers.

Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) drugs spokesman Kevin Williamson said the
executive's stance had left the law looking "mangled".

He said: "It's one of these laws that's dishonest and hypocritical and like
every dishonest and hypocritical law it has to be challenged."

He added: "We want to build a network of cannabis tolerant zones across
Scotland beginning with the Purple Haze Cafe and expanding it across the
whole of Scotland with the objective of calling on the Scottish Executive,
the police forces and the local authorities to create Scottish-wide
cannabis tolerant zones until our parliament has the powers to change the
law."

He said the campaign also aimed to turn the tolerance zones into "cannabis
information centres" and monitor arrests for personal possession of
cannabis in Scotland.

Mr Williamson claimed 500,000 peopled had used cannabis in Scotland as he
launched the SCCM during a news conference inside the Scottish Parliament.

Mr Stewart said the cafe would be "tobacco free" but anyone wishing to take
cannabis could use a vaporiser machine which he said eliminates 99% of the
carcinogenic substances in the drug.

 

 

 

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