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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: What's a girl like you doing with a joint like this?
Stefanie Marsh The Times
Friday 30 Jan 2004 A BLANKET of pure white still lay on the ground. But what was this unsightly blot on the landscape? With a patchouli-scented scarf around my head and the earnest expression usually worn by left-leaning vegetarians across my face, I arrived in Tunbridge Wells and immediately became the subject of intense suspicion. People crossed the street to get away from me, even before the day's burning issue had been broached. Already from my clothes, the people of Tunbridge Wells guessed I was No Good, a little slice of Camden come to make mischief in this, the most traditional of Middle Englands. The burning issue, as the fervent campaigners for the legalisation of cannabis and nobody else seemed to know, was the reclassification of cannabis from a Class B to a Class C drug. Those who support the move refer to it as 'a small step in the right direction'. They claim that the drug is so ubiquitous that rolling up a joint, even in public, has become a non-event. 'It's, like, really not a big deal anymore,' said a spokesman from the pro-legalisation group, Hempire. Perhaps the man from Hempire should pay a visit to Kent. We started off with a 'joint' filled with a pungent blend of herbal tobacco substitute that smelled convincingly of marijuana. 'Is that a reefer?' barked one anoraked man in his 40s who then declined to give me a light. 'Well, you better get rid of it or the plod will get you.' He walked off muttering about bloody students. Down the way in Mount Pleasant Road, two portly businessmen had sneaked out of the office to suck on a crafty cigarette. Yes, they had a light but, Christ, look at the size of that will you, John! 'Is it what I think it is?' one said, awed, before brandishing the lighter with a flourish. 'That is,' said 'John', quoting Danny the Dealer from the film Withnail and I, 'what you call a Camberwell Carrot! Never been to Camberwell but I'd like to have a look at their vegetable patches. Neither John nor his friend knew anything about the change in the law nor cared. 'For me, all that business is in the past now, darling. That's why I've moved here.'But for most people in Tunbridge Wells, a joint is an unfamiliar object, most often confused with a cigarette roll-up. In a population with a disproportionate number of people in their sixties and over, the sight of a woman smoking what looks like a very long cigarette on the street sets off only mild alarm bells. If the joint confused people, the bong - a water pipe used to smoke cannabis - baffled them. Our pistol grip rainbow bong, a bestseller among potheads at the London 'head shop' Alchemy, was variously confused with a lamp, a torch, a plunger and an objet d'art. Two women told me I could find a light at Comet, the electrical store. A third suggested Duracell. A man in a flat cap walked off in disgust, convinced that I had wanted a light for my 'bomb'. A more direct tactic was needed. We went to the tourist office. If initially the woman behind the desk had been a picture of accommodating friendliness her face swiftly reorganised itself into a cold hard stare when asked whether she could name any cannabis-smoking facilities in Tunbridge Wells. 'There are none that I know of,' came the reply through clenched teeth. What about hotel rooms? Surely a hotel room now ranks as a private space according to the new guidelines. Already her colleague had bounced up, ready to show me the door. Hadn't the law been relaxed recently? 'Not, I'm afraid, in Tunbridge Wells,'she smiled. 'You're thinking of somewhere else. Possibly not Britain. Our last stop was the restaurant Thackeray's, a no-smoking eaterie, and the only place in Tunbridge Wells to have been awarded a Michelin star. Like the tourist officer before them, the staff, friendly enough through the meal, retreated into stiff silence when we lit up what looked like a joint. Somehow they never got round to throwing us out or telling us to stub it out. Instead, watching us hawkishly from the kitchen, they muttered and growled and slowed the service down to a crawl. Surely they too had heard about and had been confused by the mysterious changes in the law. Smoking cigarettes is banned in Thackeray's but cannabis? An hour later we left, the remnants of the unmentionable pretend joint stubbed out at the table. WHERE THE LAW STANDS CLASS A: heroin, cocaine, crack, LSD, ecstasy. Penalties: possession, seven years' jail plus/or unlimited fine, or both; possession with intent to supply, life imprisonment, unlimited fine or both; supplying, life imprisonment, unlimited fine or both. CLASS B: amphetamines,barbiturates, codeines. Penalties: possession, five years or unlimited fine or both; possession with intent to supply, 14 years or an unlimited fine or both; supplying, 14 years or unlimited fine or both. CLASS C: cannabis, GHB, steroids. Penalties: possession, two years plus/or unlimited fine; possession with intent to supply, 14 years' jail plus/or unlimited fine; supplying, 14 years plus or unlimited fine.
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