Pre-election prohibition fast-track for mephedrone

In Prime Minister's Questions yesterday Gordon Brown came up with this response to a question calling for a ban on mephedrone:

The Prime Minister: I am very concerned about what my hon. Friend has told me, and I send my sincere condolences to Jordan’s family and to their friends. We are committed to preventing young people from starting to take drugs. The advice is clear that, just because a substance is legal, that does not make it safe.

A valid point - tobacco, alcohol, paracetamol, nutmeg, prozac etc.

He continued:

We are concerned specifically about the harms of mephedrone, and the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs [ACMD] is considering that and similar compounds as an absolute priority. We will receive its advice on 29 March, and subject to that advice we will take immediate action. We are determined to act to prevent this evil from hurting the young people of our country.

'Evil'? If mephedrone is 'evil' because it can hurt people, then alcohol and tobacco (which kill respectively, 100 and 300 a day in the UK), must truly be the work of Satan. This is hyberbolic twaddle straight out of the pre-election manual: 'How to garner votes in marginal constituencies by appealing to populist fears and nationalistic prejudices'.

As for ACMD, when exactly did the Government start getting so impatient for their expert advice? Certainly not when they called for the downgrading of Ecstasy from Class A to B. Or when they said cannabis should be left as Class C.

Truth be told it is already pretty clear where the ACMD are going on this.

But what would Brown do if they actually did call for enough time just to gather the evidence properly, rather than support a populist knee-jerk reaction?

Or they called for a detailed review, now or even at a later date, of any unintended consequences of absolute prohibition (including those identified by the head of the UNODC) e.g. creating a massive criminal black market, diverting money from health to criminal justice, displacing users to more harmful substances, marginalising and criminalising large numbers of otherwise law abiding users? Or causing an increase in the use of hazardous cutting agents, or the drug becoming of highly variable strength leading to increased overdose risk, or an increase in acquisitive crime if prices rise dramatically? Many of which, at least anecdotally, appear to be happening in the Channel Islands where a ban already exists.

Or, heaven forfend, what if the ACMD even called for the creation of a new holding category? Whether Class D, with tightly regulated legal sales including the provision of detailed health and use advice as suggested by the ACMD's last Chair David Nutt. Or Category X as suggested by the UK Drug Policy Commission, while all the possible options were properly modeled, to make sure we took the best route to minimize harms to individuals and society?

David Nutt's latest from the Evening Standard is well worth a look, and bearing in mind his treatment from the Government, the most likely outcome for ACMD of seeking a genuinely evidence-based review, would be finding themselves all sacked...

Update 26 March:

This is how the Daily Mail ran Nutt's views after the Standard rewrote their own story.

Gordon Brown responds to Transform's call for Impact Assessment

I received a letter from Downing Street this week, in response to my meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown to call for an Impact Assessment of the Misuse of Drugs Act. In July of last year I met with the PM to ask the Government to compare and contrast the impacts of the current prohibitionist legislation with alternatives, including legal regulation and control. Here is the briefing that I gave him.

His response is in full below. It includes the following:

"We do not intend to undertake an impact assessment comparing the costs and benefits of different legislative options for domestic drug policy. We see no merit in embarking upon such an undertaking in view of our longstanding position that we do not accept that legalisation and regulation are now, or will be in the future, an acceptable response to the presence of drugs."

So let me get this straight, the Government will not review the evidence of efficacy of the current policy or compare it with alternatives because it is committed to the current regime and, without exploring the outcomes of the Misuse of Drugs Act or prohibition, has decided that alternatives are "not acceptable". So far, so bad. Let's not let evidence get in the way of an effective drug policy (witness the sacking of David Nutt). Meanwhile our tax pounds will be spent on prohibition, without checking whether the policy is of any use, or heaven forfend, totally counterproductive...

I am also not overly reassured by:

"We are working to ensure that UN drugs activity is based on evidence and effectiveness..."

Do not forget that the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime has identified the Drug Control System as the cause of much of the 'drug problem'.

But there's more - the absolutist position - that regulation will not be acceptable now "...or in the future..." Yes folks, that means for ever!

...and is a statement that is completely undermined by the fact that legal regulation is the Government's chosen option for alcohol, tobacco, caffeine etc etc

It also suggests:

"The methodological challenges involved in attempting to calculate the scale of the drugs market (supply and demand) and the costs of its harms are very significant."

Oh, so it's too hard is it? I can think of many experts from all round the world who would be delighted to assist in this task. At any rate, this "challenge" is created by gifting the market to unregulated dealers in the first place.

With David Cameron back pedalling on his previously held position (when he sat as a backbencher on the Home Affairs Select Committee in 2001/2), that the UK should initiate a debate at the UN on alternatives to prohibition, the outcome of the upcoming general election is unlikely to herald early reform in the right direction.

Should you wish to ask your MP or parliamentary candidate if they support an Impact Assessment, feel free to use our briefing or contact us for advice.

Transform will be bringing you more on drug policy election shenanigans over the next few months.

(Click on the images to enlarge the letter and view it full screen)

PM hears case for Impact Assessment of drug laws

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has held an important meeting with drugs policy campaigning group Transform, and Lembit Öpik, Liberal Democrat MP for Montgomeryshire to hear the case for an impact assessment of drug laws.

Danny Kushlick, Head of Policy and Communications at Transform Drug Policy Foundation said after the meeting:

"Impact assessment is a standard tool in Government for scrutinising policy and exploring alternative options that could achieve better outcomes. Our drug laws have not been assessed effectively since their enactment nearly forty years ago and the world is a very different place now."

"I am confident that over the coming months and years, the drug laws will receive the level of parliamentary scrutiny currently reserved for the introduction of new legislation. Impact assessment offers us all a major opportunity to reframe the drug policy debate in a less emotive and more productive manner."

"We are extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for considering our request. Mr. Brown was interested to hear about the 2003 No.10 Strategy Unit Report which he had not seen, which shows that supply side enforcement cannot work in the long term, and actually creates huge collateral damage."

Commenting after the meeting, Lembit Öpik said:

"While the Prime Minister didn't commit to implementing our request there and then, I am satisfied that he truly did listen. The impact assessment won't happen tomorrow, but this meeting is a start of a serious dialogue. We don't want to bully anyone into going along with this research - nor could we! But I'm confident that in the months ahead we will persuade the government that this is in everyone's interests, and I'm extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for holding this meeting to hear our case."

Lembit Öpik added: "Overall, the Prime Minister had a useful discussion with the delegation. No commitment has at this stage been made, but he clearly takes seriously any proposals which have the potential to help us address the misuse of drugs, and all the associated social and health costs which go with it."

Professor Richard Wilkinson, co-author of “The Spirit Level”, said;

"I support the Transform Drug Policy Foundation initiative and urge the government to undertake an impact assessment of the Misuse of Drugs Act."

ENDS

Notes to editors

1. An analysis of the 2003 No10 Strategy Unit Report can be read here

2. Richard Wilkinson is Emeritus Professor of Social Epidemiology at Nottingham University, author of 'Unequal societies; the afflictions of inequality', and co-author, with Kate Pickett, of ‘The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better’

3. Government guidelines on Impact Assessments are available here


Here is the briefing note that Transform gave to Mr Brown:

Towards Effective Drug Policy: Time for an Impact Assessment

Transform Drug Policy Foundation
Transform is a think-tank that campaigns for sustainable well being, promoting the replacement of prohibition with effective and humane systems to regulate drugs.

Recommendation
The UK Government should lead the world by carrying out an Impact Assessment (IA) of domestic drugs prohibition, starting with the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and related legislation. An IA should model all the alternatives including stepping up prohibition, Portuguese-style decriminalisation, and legal regulation. The EC and UN should undertake a similar exercise internationally to incorporate impacts on producer and transit countries, and ensure drug policy no longer undermines human development, human security and human rights.

Basis for recommendation

• Despite the billions spent each year, evidence from around the globe, (including the PM’s Strategy Unit Drugs Report of 2003 ) shows the prohibitionist approach to drugs has consistently delivered the opposite of its stated goals, with the poor and marginalised hit hardest.

• The Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime also admits the international drug control system has massive ‘unintended consequences’ including: creating a huge criminal market; displacing policy from health to enforcement; and geographical displacement (the ‘balloon effect’).

• At a time of economic stricture, it is crucial that drugs expenditure is cost-effective, with all potential alternatives meaningfully explored. Transform’s cost-benefit analysis (based on Government data) shows a move to legal regulation and control could:

o Save the UK billions of pounds to spend on other priorities
o Halve property crime and the prison population
o Remove a huge obstacle to development and security in Afghanistan and beyond

• Using Impact Assessment as a guiding tool would help end the emotive and polarised debate around drug policy reform, and enable politicians to genuinely engage with the search for better alternatives.

Appendix

Introduction
We all share the common goal of a drug policy that maximises environmental, physical, psychological and social wellbeing worldwide. Yet, whether viewed internationally or domestically, the prohibitionist approach has seen drug supply and availability increasing; use of drugs that cause the most harm increasing; health harms increasing; and massive levels of crime leading to a crisis in our criminal justice systems. Illicit drug profits are enriching criminals, fuelling conflict and undermining security and development in producer and transit countries from Mexico and Guinea Bissau, to Afghanistan and Colombia, with the gravest impacts falling upon the poor and marginalised.

Whilst the UNODC acknowledges the high costs of prohibition, it has so far neglected to count them, or model alternatives. Similarly, the Home Office acknowledges that legal regulation of drug markets would have benefits , but claims they would be outweighed by the costs. Yet no such cost-benefit analysis has ever been carried out in the UK, or anywhere else. Value for money studies commissioned in 2007 remain unpublished.

The UK could take the lead by carrying out an objective, independent, national assessment, comparing current policy with the alternatives; encourage other consumer, producer and transit countries to follow suit; and call for international assessments by the EC and UN.

A UK Impact Assessment
In the UK, drug legislation has changed little since the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act (MDA) which has for many years been colliding with dramatically changed circumstances, including a massive increase in the use of illegal drugs, and a correspondingly huge illegal market, compounded by globalisation. As a result, a root and branch review is long overdue, and an Impact Assessment of the MDA should form the first step in genuinely assessing the UK’s approach to drugs.

Through allowing the outcomes of any government intervention to be assessed against the goals it is supposed to meet, along with modelling alternatives, IA is a sophisticated tool to strengthen evidence-based policy-making, improve accountability and transparency, and enable more informed public and parliamentary debate. Typically IAs now consider the potential or actual impacts (positive and negative) of a policy in terms of the three pillars of sustainable development – economic, social and environmental.

An IA aimed at helping to deliver evidence-based policy - behind which all stakeholders can unite - would put all options on the table, without committing any stakeholder to a specific position: from stepping up prohibition, through decriminalisation, to legal regulation and control. In addition to current mechanisms for regulating the supply of legal drugs and intoxicants, there are a variety of existing approaches to dealing with illicit drugs. These include Portugal’s decriminalisation of possession of drugs since 2001 (widely hailed as a success, including by the UNODC), the long-term large-scale maintenance prescription of heroin in Switzerland, and the Netherlands ‘coffee-shop’ system for cannabis.

The application of IA for ex post evaluation of this kind has been less common than its use in ex ante assessment of proposed new measures. However, there is now recognition of the need for more evaluation work of this kind, for example in the European Commission work on IA.

When an entire UK Act is subject to Impact Assessment it is often broken down into smaller sections each of which has a separate IA. For example the Police and Crime Bill currently before Parliament has twenty separate IAs addressing different aspects.

The UNODC currently send out a biannual survey to member countries as part of its information gathering for the World Drug Report. Transform would like to see this include a template with questions for a country level IA, which could be collated as the basis for a global IA.

An Impact Assessment is Overdue
An IA of drug policy would be in line with Government guidelines. For example, the Treasury Green Book states that: "...no policy, programme or project is adopted without first having the answer to these questions: (1) Are there better ways to achieve this objective? (2) Are there better uses for these resources?"

More specifically, BERR IA guidelines say that all new legislation and policy changes with a cost or benefit to the public, private or third sectors greater than £5 million require the relevant government department to conduct an IA. This threshold has been crossed by many individual drug related interventions, and a number of other triggers have been pulled including: “When review leads to the identification of new policy challenges (perhaps arising from unintended consequences of the intervention itself), the [IA] process begins again."

Similarly, the National Audit Office 2001 guide ‘Modern Policymaking: Ensuring policies deliver value for money’ states: “Departments…need to review policies, for example to determine when the time is right to modify a policy in response to changing circumstances so that it remains relevant and cost effective; and departments may need to terminate policies if they are no longer cost effective or they are not delivering the policy outcomes intended.”

As previously noted there are huge unintended consequences of the current drug control system, and evidence shows the MDA is not delivering what it was supposed to - for example a twenty-fold increase in heroin use.

There is a UK precedent for using IA to compare prohibition with decriminalisation or legal regulation of drugs. The 2005 Drugs Act had an Impact Assessment of the proposal to make Magic Mushrooms a Class A drug, including the option of allowing licensed sales.

For too long the debate around drugs policy reform has been paralysed and polarised. An Impact Assessment offers an objective, independent and neutral tool for enabling key stakeholders to work together to create a drug policy fit for the 21st Century.

See also from the Transform blog:

• MP calls for Impact Assessment of drugs policy in prime ministers questions
  
  
• Transform publishes cost benefit analysis study of prohibition / regulation

MP calls for impact assessment of drugs policy in Prime Minister’s Questions

In today’s Prime Minister’s Questions Lembit Opik MP requested a meeting with the PM to propose a full impact assessment of current drug policy.

His full question was:

“A new European Commission report on drugs shows that despite prohibition the illegal drugs trade has thrived, creating what the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, describes as a “staggering” criminal market, destabilising health policies and entire countries.

“As such, will the Leader of the House please convey my request to meet the Prime Minister to propose a comprehensive impact assessment of current drugs policy, to help us tackle this crisis in an evidence-based way?”

In response, Harriet Harman MP, Leader of the House, answering on behalf of the Prime Minister who is this week attending the G20 conference, said:

“I will pass on his request to the Prime Minister who I’m sure will agree that we need to make sure that every bit of support is available to those who are addicted to drugs and we need to crack down hard on dealers.”

UK drug enforcement policy is unique in terms of delivering the exact opposite of its intended outcomes, consistently, for decades - massive levels of drug misuse, health damage, and crime. This huge expenditure is also unique in the lack of scrutiny it has been subject to with regards to cost effectiveness or attempts to quantify these unintended negative consequences. Such scrutiny is long overdue and we welcome this initiative from Mr Opik

A full impact assessment laying out and counting the costs of current drugs policy in a structured and detailed way for the first time, would be a significant step towards making future policy evidence-based – and therefore more effective, just and humane.

Transform has long been calling for a full Cost Benefit of Analysis (CBA), which an impact assessment would be part of, comparing current UK drug policy with alternatives. We would like the UN to orchestrate a similar initiative at the global level. At a recent All Party Parliamentary Group on the Mis-use of Drugs meeting Transform laid down a challenge to all: support this approach, or don’t pretend you are interested in having evidence-based drugs policy.

We will be publishing our own UK oriented CBA soon, laying out the best evidence available, and the gaps in research that should be filled, so watch this space.

Millions quit cannabis following reclassification

After listening to Jacqui Smith MP talking about skunk cannabis in Parliament today millions of young people have decided to quit using cannabis and drink 3 litre bottles of white-lightning cider instead. Across the housing estates of Britain vulnerable young people, more used to the daily truant ritual of a skunk fueled psychotic axe-rampage, could be witnessed huddled around radio's hanging on Home Secretary Smith's every word. Interviewed afterwards many were of the opinion that now they faced a super-stern warning from the police for cannabis possession, instead of a mere moderately-stern warning like in the old days, the risk was simply too great. It was time to quit weed and hit the cider big time. This fear was combined with a new found insight into cannabis provided by Gordon Brown, specifically regarding the 'lethal' skunk version of the otherwise completely benign sixties flower power drug smoked by Smith and her cabinet colleagues way back when.

The general opinion around the bus shelters was that Smith and Brown, given their in-depth academic research, backgrounds in the drugs field and Phd's in epidemiology and psycho-pharmacology respectively, were far better qualified to advise today's youngsters about drug harms than those 'unqualified jokers on the thingy-wotsit committee', as one former feral youth described it. He added;

'now cannabis is class B and we all know how bad it is for you again, there's no point wasting money on education, treatment and prevention any more. That cash would be far better given to the police so they can alienate us with some futile heavy-handed enforcement like they did with my big brother. A criminal record should really help any remaining tokers get on in life'.

lethal skunkabis: relax, its a thing of the past

Other reports are also coming in of queues forming at airports of evil Vietnamese gangsters waiting to fly home. Interviews suggest that now no-one is smoking lethal skunkabis anymore the evil foreign criminals have decided to close their network of suburban cannabis factories. There are also strong indications that a major contribution to the foreign criminal exodus is fear of the move from a trifling 14 year sentence for cannabis supply under the namby-pamby old class C regime to the new scary 14 year sentence under Class B.

Triumphant ministers have drawn comparisons to the reclassification of meth-amphetamines (combined with the new war on lemsip) that successfully scared off any potential meth users or dealers, and the classification of ketamine which similarly put paid to use of that drug with a flick of the legislators pen.

Who knew drug policy was so simple?

Miserable re-classification saga enters its final furlong

So this is how it’s probably going to play out. At some point after Thursday’s local election, potentially making use of the ‘burying bad news’ cover the election aftermath will provide, the Government will release the ACMD report that will call for cannabis classification to remain unchanged. The report will acknowledge changes in the cannabis market with a greater prevalence of more potent indoor grown varieties but will say the evidence of risks – that will be acknowledged in detail - have not changed significantly since 2005 and stick to their position that on balance, relative to other classified drugs, C is the appropriate classification. They will clearly state that this does not in any way mean cannabis is harmless, and will probably make some thinly veiled critical comments about how media and political discourse has distracted from rational analysis of the science.

Since the committee’s report has already been leaked and its headline call exhaustively discussed the detail of the report will probably not garner much coverage; this is a shame as the report will doubtless be a thorough and authoritative review, but editorial lines have largely already been determined and political positions most certainly have. At some point next week Brown will announce his intention to reclassify regardless – his slow drip drip of public pronouncements that this is his intention have made this increasingly clear. Even if the ACMD report offered him an ‘out’, it seems clear now that the ‘leaks’ from ‘government sources’ -that he has made no effort to contradict- indicate his mind is made up. He will offer some sort of rhetorical sop to the ACMD but will argue for the change deploying much of the same science-free moral posturing that has characterised his recent comments. He will be bolstered by two main rhetorical planks.

Firstly the Government will make sure some suitably alarming new evidence on ‘skunk’ is released, probably on the same day as the Brown announcement. This is likely to relate to the (neither new nor especially alarming) fact that ‘skunk’ seizures now suggest an increasingly saturated market (it will have probably already been described in the unread detail of the ACMD report). No mention will be made of the role of profit driven illicit market economics in fueling the 'skunkification' of the UK market – although if we are very lucky the ACMD might just – at a push – allude to this analysis (but i doubt it). So the first plank of the case will be established by tapping into the current media skunk panic.

The second will be to refer to the ACPO support for the move back to B (and probaly - to a lesser extent - support from some on message magistrates and mental health charities). The authority of the police is hard to argue with in the public mind and the panic inducing rhetoric of ‘cannabis factories’, especially the ones staffed by foreigners, provide a potent narrative for justifying a punitive crackdown. The ACPO call has been a stinker; I sat though the intellectual and empirical wasteland that was their presentation to the ACMD, and their written presentation, (which I have also had the non-privilege of reading) covered much the same territory. The case is nominally based on two things; their concern for skunk and mental health, an arena in which they have no expertise and that has clearly been informed by media panic rather than an academic literature review (they should obviously defer to the ACMD but have jumped the gun, like the PM, and pre-empted the experts conclusions, defaulting to the Daily Mail position). And secondly, on the growing problem of ‘cannabis factories’. As has been discussed previously this enforcement argument is disingenuous as the penalties for supply of class C drugs were increased to parity with class B when cannabis was moved in 2004 (14 years for supply - hardly a 'soft on cannabis' position but there you go). So a move back to B will have precisely zero impact on cannabis supply penalties (which will stay the same) and any corresponding deterrence, even on the un-evidenced assumption that any penalty increase would have deterred some production/supply (it clearly wouldn't). If the police are concerned about cannabis factories they are free to prioritize and direct more enforcement resources at them – changes in classification are entirely irrelevant and claiming otherwise is simply misleading. Want to place bets on which ACMD members voted for the move to B?

a cannabis factory in Canada. A completely (non-evil) legal one as it happens

For ACPO this is all about politics. The Government have enormous power to wield over the Police – and clearly have done just that; ACPO have been unfailingly compliant on Government drug policy decisions, they supported the original B to C reclassification, they supported the 2005 Drugs Bill (all 21 controversial clauses), and now they are supporting the re-re-classification. Its almost spooky. Trying to think of the last time ACPO (or Sir Iain Blair) defied the Government on drug policy? Don’t bother – it’s never happened. If the public health arguments aren’t there to support increasing penalties against drug users the Government can always appeal to popular fears about crime. ACPO have been pressured to provide the Government with the required moral authority and they have dutifully delivered.

So, what is the best we can hope for? As Paul Flynn MP has described, in some ways the Government on drugs is a bit like a duck; on the surface shouting 'tougher tougher', but underwater, desperately paddling in the direction of pragmatic harm reduction. So can Brown have his cake and eat it? Perhaps to some extent. It is not unlikely that Police guidance on cannabis arrests will remain the same, with the discretion to use warnings, cautions or arrests which exists now will not be made more punitive, and in fact – for all the bluster and posturing, street level enforcement will be largely unchanged – bar a few high profile crackdowns for the cameras. There doesn't seem to be any real appetite from anyone for mass arrests and more criminalisation of young people (so why... but.... hang on...I don't follow.....).

The small band of anti-cannabis fanatics for whom re-re-classification has assumed near religious significance will doubtless smile in triumph at the victory in their titanic battle against the evil scourge, safe in knowledge that now everything will be fine (probably hypocritically toasting victory with lashings of the legal stuff). Their conceit that there has been a seismic shift in the political culture will probably be no worse than that of the cannabis evangelists four years ago. They were both wrong. Classification isn’t symbolic of anything other than the cyclical interplay political spin and media headline chasing, and the ground level change itself will make little or no difference to the millions of users who simply couldn’t care less what Jacqui Smith has to say about their leisure time, even if they actually know who she is. The real difference will only come when consenting adult use is not only decriminalised completely, but production supply is brought back within the law and properly regulated. It will take the non-impact, or active costs, of the latest change to put that debate meaningfully back on the mainstream political agenda (in this backward country anyway). These things seem to go in cycles so we will be back here again in a couple of years.

For now I’m just glad this round is soon to be over because it’s very, very, very dull and there are far more interesting and important thinks to talk about like ya’know...

...*points vaguely out the window*

on the off chance you've not had enough, there's plenty more cannabis discussions on the blog

also, a strong op-ed from Simon Jenkins in today's Guardian (accepting comment's)

New research highlights effects of cannabis on hyperbole

As Gordon Brown apparently prepares to ignore his own expert advisers and side with the tabloids in rehashing our cannabis laws, he has well and truly jumped aboard the skunk-panic bandwagon - declaring on GMTV this morning that it is 'lethal'.

On the Comment is Free blog someone has posted some historical reefer madness quotes under an excellent piece from Paul Corry from the mental health charity Rethink. Here they are for your reading pleasure, with Gordon Brown's earning his place and now joining them at at the end.

(Now just to restate, whilst the majority of users do not experience problems with cannabis, its use has risks and no one is claiming it is harmless or that some users have not been harmed by it. However, emotive anecdotes and tabloid journal trawls for scarey sounding epedemiologocal data that can form the basis of a shock headline or soundbite, cannot be the basis of sound public health policy making, as it would seem, we are about to learn. Again.)

Alex Wodak describes politicians use of drug policy as 'poltical viagra'. Gordon, you're a stud...

". . . The dope begins its DEADLY WORK of arousing SEXUAL PASSIONS . . . with no restraint as to COLOR or RACE!"
Rev. Robert James Devine, 'Assassin of Youth: Marihuana' 1943


"marihuana leads to pacifism and communist brainwashing!"
Federal Bureau of Narcotics Chief Harry J. Anslinger1948

"A California man decapitated his best friend while under the violent spell of the smoke!"
Newsweek August 14, 1937

"Under [MARIHUANA'S] influence, prison inmates fall desperately in love with each other, just as they would with women outside prison walls!"
Earle Albert Rowell & Robert Rowell, 'On the Trail of Marihuana the Weed of Madness', 1939

"reefer makes darkies think they're as good as white men."
Harry J. Anslinger, 1929

"Was it marijuana, the new Mexican drug, that nerved the murderous arm of Clara Phillips when she hammered out her victim's life in Los Angeles? . . . three-forth's of the crimes of violence in this country today are committed by dope slaves - that is a matter of cold record."
Annie Laurie's column, Hearst newspapers nationwide, date unknown

"Permanent brain damage is one of the inevitable results of the use of marijuana."
Ronald Reagan, 1974

"Marijuana leads to homosexuality . . . and therefore to AIDS."
White House Drug Czar Carlton Turner, 1986


"Marijuana is ten times more dangerous than twenty years ago."
Presidential Candidate Bill Clinton, 1992

"The shift to Class C - which meant most users faced a simple ticking off if caught - has coincided with an explosion in drug crime and several brutal cannabis-related murders."
The Daily Mail, 29th April 2008

"Cannabis 'is making teenagers impotent', say doctors"
The Daily Mail, 28th April 2008

"(But) I think people know my view about cannabis and particularly about this lethal version of it, skunk."
Gordon Brown, GMTV, Tuesday 29 April

Thanks to http://www.reefermadnesslondon.com/

Cannabis making politicians go all weird. Again.

Just what is it about cannabis that makes certain politicians act so bizarrely and disconnect from reality is such spectacular fashion? And this is without even smoking it (although actually, most of them have). Moreover, there appears to be a sort of dose-response effect in evidence: The more senior they get, the more deranged they seem to become. Look at how Cameron has metamorphosed from a pragmatic backbencher and member of the Home Affairs Select Committee in 2001 calling for cannabis to be reclassified from B to C, into a classic reactionary-right drug warrior, now as party leader, calling for it to be moved back from C to B. And see how Gordon Brown, who never made a peep about drug policy before becoming PM, is now grabbing any opportunity to wheel out his new tough line advocating mass criminalisation of young cannabis users (no child left behind) as a way of asserting his prime-ministerial strength and moral fortitude. Rational thought, it appears, is the first casualty of a drug war.

As anyone who has been following the seemingly endless (we are now in year 7) cannabis reclassification shenanigans knows, last week Gordon Brown strongly implied that he planned to reclassify cannabis from C back to B regardless of what the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs recommends at the end of this month (but with all the serious money, and BBC leaks, on them calling for it to stay in C). In case you don’t know the ACMD are the 30 or so Government appointed scientists and experts from the drugs field who have recently completed their marathon 4-day literature review and public consultation on the B/C question.

Brown’s position on this question was echoed by another recent example of how politics and emotive anecdote are trumping rationality, pragmatism and science; a Daily Telegraph op-ed last week with the willfully ignorant headline (seeming to almost revel in the idea of bad science led policy making):

‘Ignore the experts and reclassify cannabis’.

This veritable beacon of endarkenment thinking comes from Debra Bell, whose ‘Talking About Cannabis’ website and campaign (built around her experiences of her son’s cannabis problems) is the perfect example of precisely why science based policy decisions should be made by committees of experts and not distraught parents. Whilst Debra and other parents or carers who have been through similar personal tragedies deserve our sympathy and should of course be heard (and to give the Council credit, Debra was amongst those invited to present to the hearings in March), policy decisions, such as drug classification, that are very specifically based on science based literature reviews and objective harm rankings, should be left to the scientists.

poster from a from a previous generation's cannabis panic, US 1938.

The classification system is – as Transform have long argued - horribly flawed, outdated, and ineffective, but when it comes to the science based harm rankings that at least nominaly constitute the basis of the ABC system, that is, for better or worse, what the ACMD do. In fact it’s almost the only thing they have time for, not least because they have to do virtually the same cannabis review of the virtually the same literature (and, surprise surprise, come to virtually the same conclusions) every couple of years, just to satisfy the tabloid driven political whims of successive political leaders.

As the blog has already highlighted, it is bizarre, not to mention intellectually offensive, to ask a panel of your own appointed experts to review a body of evidence and make recommendations (at considerable tax-payers expense – how many tens of thousands did the recent review cost?) only to declare you will overrule their decision if it doesn’t go your way before its even published. Brown’s almost Mugabe-like denial of evidence could not be clearer. Ignoring or overuling the Council's finding would be one thing, but incredibly Brown was proudly making his intentions clear before the ACMD had even begun their deliberations, let alone report back to him, on the expensive and time consuming review that he ordered be undertaken.

Evan Harris, a Lib Dem MP and consistent exponent of science and evidence based policy making (he sat on the Science and Technology Committee that produced 2006’s report on the classification system), made this point loud and clear during a debate on classification on last week’s BBC Radio 4 show ‘Any Questions’:

“to ask the experts to do the work and say in advance that you are not going to accept their view is I think corrupting the whole idea of whether you are going to have proper evidence based policy and what matters in drugs policy is what works to help to protect the health of people and we know that education works not gesture politics by politicians thinking that the classification of a drug is a sign of machismo, it isn’t, it is a failed policy the one that Gordon Brown wants to pursue and the experts will tell him that.” (Applause)

Harris also notes that:

"education does work and what we do know that criminalizing young people, forcing it underground and giving criminals the ability to make money in the black economy is not the way to tackle the problem. In Holland where they did decriminalize they had much lower domestic use of cannabis than we have here where we have criminalized so I am interested in what works"

You can listen to the show here - Or read the transcript of it here (the debate continues in Any Answers – also available on BBC listen again)

Helen Mary Jones, Plaid Cymru’s Health spokesperson, also on the show, went as far as to say that it is:

‘very dangerous for politicians to ignore expert advice when they have asked for it’.

It is notable that if Brown does overrule the ACMD’s decision, having specifically requested their opinion it will be a first in the Council’s 37 year history.

In a debate in the House of Commons last week, similar points were put to the drugs minister, most pertinently by Transform supporter Paul Flynn MP who said that drug policy:

‘has been an evidence-free zone that is rich in prejudice, ignorance and denial’.

He was backed up by Tom Brake MP who made the point that:

‘we need to ensure that our decisions are based on evidence and science if we are serious about tackling… drugs’.

Much of the current hysteria regarding cannabis at present revolves around the increasing market prevalence of more potent cannabis, mostly indoor grown varieties that the media and political discourse now blanket terms ‘skunk’ (as if it is somehow an entirely different drug or plant to ‘cannabis’). In a letter to the Times Newspaper, Francis Wilkinson, former Chief Constable of Gwent (and a Transform patron), made the point that it is the economics of a completely unregulated market that fuel the emergence of the stronger forms of any drug.

‘More powerful strains of cannabis (skunk) have been developed as a direct result of it being illegal. More powerful means similar quantities for the same effect: more profit for the same weight. This trend towards illegal drugs becoming more powerful is universal: coca leaves chewed by the Andean Indians become refined cocaine and then the more dangerous crack; poppy seeds prepared and smoked become refined (but often impure) injectable heroin. The engine of these developments is the international drug trade’s desire for greater profits.’

This very point was prominently put to the ACMD cannabis reclassification hearings (in writing and in the oral presentation on the day) by Transform’s Steve Rolles, (as well as being raised by him on the BBC's Today program last week).

This is the final tragic irony of Brown’s emerging expertaphobia; The ‘skunk’ problem he proclaims to be seeking to address has actually been largely created by the very enforcement-led solution he now wants to intensify.

ACMD cannabis report update.....

So...on the announcement itself, well it comes as no surprise as regular readers will know. The details leaked to the BBC were scant and Downing street has hurriedly denied that this is the whole story. It probably isn't.

I fully expect the ACMD report to make a series of other policy recommendations along with their inevitably thorough analysis. They will emphasise the risks, focussing on mental health issues. They will certainly repeat their calls for a big public education push - no doubt highlighting the particular dangers raised by the increasing prevalence of stronger cannabis - probably with specifics about how it should be targeted at the most vulnerable groups. This, they will argue, is likely to be a more effective response than increasing penalties. They will re-emphasise that the classification system is about ranking relative harms (and not sending out messages that suit politicians at election time).

They will probably call for research on various areas where the data is a bit thin and understanding either poor or emerging. They may dabble with some ideas like fixed penalties for possession offenses, but I doubt it. I also imagine that ACMD chair, as a last flourish before he retires, will make sure there are some fairly clear statements about how the review and the cannabis debate has been driven by tabloid and party political agendas (Nothing could be clearer than today's utterly ludicrous statement from drug warrior jack-in-the-box David Davis who says that Brown should not even have consulted them) .

What Brown will now do is moot, but he is no idiot and will have been well aware that the committee was likely to come to the conclusion it has, probably when he called the review in the first place (barely two years after the previous one - at which the c decision had been almost unanimous), and certainly before he made his comments earlier in the week at his monthly press conference. He now faces an entirely self made dilemma, as Philip Jhonston at the Telegraph has identified. He either overrules the committee and forfeits any last vestige of scientific 'evidence based' credibility his drug policy may still be clinging to, or he accepts their conclusions and leaves him self open to populist reactionary clowns like David Davis scoring points against him in the right leaning tabloids. I'm not remotely sympathetic as he has created this problem entirely for himself with his blinkered pre-election moral posturing. One thing is clear - this is all about politics now.

I suspect, but with only moderate certainty (and political idiocy never fails to suprise me), that Brown will use the ACMD report as an 'out' (I note the Guardian suggest otherwise). Maintain C, but launch a raft of measures, show he is 'doing something' and emphasize his view that cannabis use is illegal and unacceptable:

• a big education push (which will be politically driven rather than evidence based and therefore almost certainly pointless and rubbish)
• some ill thought out knee-jerk enforcement measures, probably focusing on evil 'cannabis factories', maybe some new police powers (to keep them happy).
  
• lashings of self righteous rhetoric about protecting the kids, evil, scourges, and so on.

Theres no good way out of this. The whole thing has been an embarrassing waste of time whatever the outcome. Reformers wont celebrate - the legal regulation debate, even the wider debate around the classification system, has been largely lost in the fire fighting. The hang'm and flog'm drug warriors wont have anything to celebrate even if Brown does go nuclear and move back to B; It really wont make any difference - his opponents will still find ways to attack him for prevaricating or ignoring his own experts, whilst the police will largely continue to enforce the law as they see fit, just like they did before.

And people who want to smoke will continue to do so. Cannabis will remain more or less freely available and the young people of this country will be even less interested in what authority figures have to say about it.

background:

The ACMD cannabis decision: stay in class C

Gordon Brown on drugs: enemy of pragmatism friend of the mafia

Brown on Cannabis - it gets worse

Transform briefings

submission to the ACMD review

Article on the classification system in Drugs and Alcohol Today


Transform media coverage

Unsurprisingly perhaps, given all the work we have done on this unendingly tedious classification saga, when the BBC's Danny Shaw got his scoop on the ACMD decision Transform were fairly near the top of the media pundit invites list. So its been quite a busy day and this being the Transform media blog, here's a list of Transform's media appearances:

• The Today Program, BBC Radio 4 (listen again to the 4 minute section here - real media format) - also featuring in news snippet at 8am
• BBC breakfast television (live sofa interview after a news item - then used in snippets throughout the day on news 24)
• BBC News 24 - studio interview
• BBC1 evening news (6 and 10 o'clock) prerecorded interview
  
• BBC Radio Scotland live interview
• Press Association multimedia interview
• Independent Radio News interview (syndicated around the country)
• various other local BBC radio
• BBC news website quote
  
• Guardian website quote
• Talk Sport radio
  

Listing this is more than just self aggrandisment - even if this is essentially a non-story (committee decides some thing as last time - shock) the Transform coverage reflects how our high quality work and commitment has paid off in terms of mainstream profile for a reasoned and credible drug policy reform position.

Plans to reclassify cannabis obscure real debate

So Transform have been in The Economist, The Guardian, Take a Break, and Socialist Worker within a fortnight. At least no one can accuse us of being partisan or not having an equal opportunities media strategy. Below is my effort on cannabis reclassification for our left-leaning friends in the Socialist Worker Party. And before anyone accuses us of being a bunch of commies, just to let you know we will write articles for anyone who asks (within reason).

Plans to reclassify cannabis obscure real debate

The government’s new review of cannabis classification will not help the situation, writes Steve Rolles

The debate around cannabis is once again in the spotlight. The government’s Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) last week started a review of cannabis classification, the third such review in six years.

Cannabis was downgraded from a class B drug, that can result in a five year prison sentence, to class C, which has a maximum two year sentence.

Superficially Gordon Brown called for the review because of emerging evidence of cannabis health risks and the increasing prevalence of the more potent and risky “skunk” cannabis. But the political context cannot be ignored.

This first re-review of the classification of cannabis in 2005 was announced publicly by Charles Clarke just two months before a general election – traditionally when the main parties showcase how “tough” they are on law and order issues.

The Tories were making political capital by deploying cliches about the government “sending out the wrong message” and being “soft on drugs”.

Regulation

They had proclaimed their support for a move back to class B. Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats were taking flak for their “soft” drugs policy – which calls for legalisation and regulation of cannabis in the longer term – from both of the other main parties.

Clarke’s call for an ACMD review effectively neutralised political attacks – and conveniently kicked the cannabis issue off the political agenda until well after the election.

It seems no coincidence that the reclassification issue then reappeared in the run-up to an expected general election in autumn last year.

This was an almost exact mirror of the experience from three years earlier, except this time around it was announced by the new prime minister rather than the home secretary.

It appeared the announcement was part of an attempt to draw a line under some of Tony Blair’s more controversial policy initiatives while establishing Brown’s “moral” credentials with conservative voters and the media.

Cannabis classification has become a political football. Its symbolic importance vastly outstrips the policy relevance of what is a fairly minor tweak to enforcement practice.

Unfortunately there has been a mistaken conflation of the debate around the harms of cannabis use and the debate around what the policy response to those harms should be.

Away from the sensationalist media coverage, scaremongering and moral grandstanding, there is no evidence to show that increasing criminal penalties for a given drug is associated with a fall in use or overall harm.

But it is often the case that increasing penalties will have unintended negative consequences. For cannabis, these push the market towards ever more potent and profitable strains and lead to the criminalisation of young people.

Current policy thinking also fails to make a distinction between the problematic and non-problematic use of cannabis.

Punitive

It fails to distinguish between the harms caused by cannabis use, and those created or made worse by a punitive enforcement strategy, and the illicit activity it generates.

The entire classification system is fundamentally flawed. The harm a drug does depends on the nature of the user, the dose of the drug consumed and the method of consumption.

Translating generalisations about harms to an entire population into penalties for individuals is unscientific and unjust.

It cannot be ethical to increase the penalties for the majority because a small proportion of users experience difficulties or mental health problems.

Criminal law is supposed to prevent crime, not “send out” public health messages. When this has been tried it has been spectacularly ineffective, as the increase of cannabis use over the last 34 years demonstrates.

Moreover it has been counter-productive, making drugs more dangerous, while fostering distrust of public health messages among young people.

The aim of drug policy should be to reduce the harm drugs cause. Current policy is failing to do this. Only by rational consideration of prohibition’s failure, and of the policy alternatives, can we take positive steps toward this goal.

In the short term this is unlikely to happen. It seems likely that the ACMD will re-assert its support for cannabis being in class C – and equally likely that the government will overrule them and move it to class B regardless.

This would be a victory for the tabloid agenda over science and reason – but in the emotive arena of drug policy, it’s the same old story.

note: this is a heavily edited version of what I sent in, so don't quote me on it.

note: SWP has a policy for the legalisation of cannabis (as does the Green party, the Lib Dems, and apparently *coughs* Veritas).

ACPO's baffling u-turn on cannabis classification

Scroll down for the main blog post.....

Transform blog CANNABIS links:

In many ways a distraction from more pressing drug policy issues but, particularly with the whole sorry reclassification saga unfolding over the last few years, it has obsessed the media and correspondingly provided a rich vein of bad reporting, bad science and political idiocy that is hard for a critical drug policy blog to ignore. The Daily Mail and Independent on Sunday in particular have distinguished themselves, but they have been far from alone.

Daily Mail, Bad Science Drugs Deaths and Reclassification
Aug 06. The first blog to really critique bad science and misreporting of drug statistics. On this occasion linking cannabis reclassification with a rise in opiate deaths (that took place before cannabis was reclassified - Doh!). More Daily Mail silliness here and here.

How the Independent on Sunday got it horribly wrong on Cannabis
March 07. A masterpiece in poor journalism is forensically taken to pieces. The biggest hit count of any blog post to date. Follow ups part 1, part 2

More shoddy reefer madness reporting of cannabis risks
July 07. The Lancet fails to discourage poor reporting of statistics.

Brown on cannabis - it gets worse
Sept 07. The cannabis reclassification saga comes to a head, the new PM makes a fool of himself, and any vague pretense of evidence based policy making goes out the window once and for all

More Independent on Sunday reefer madness exposed
Oct 07. A case of grotesquely misrepresented research and shock headline-mongering. The authors of the research question thanked us for this one, the IOS have failed to apologize or print a correction (also belongs under bad science)

Smoking stuff bad for lungs shock
Jan 08. Another one of those reheated drugs bad for you-shock stories.

Millions quit cannabis following reclassification
May 08. Satire – pulled in tonnes of hits after 'going viral' on social networking sites

ACPO's baffling u-turn on cannabis classification

The BBC reports today that The Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) has moved its position from supporting 2004's reclassification of cannabis to now supporting its re-reclassification back to B, but their stated motives for this change of position simply don't add up.

From the BBC report (there is no ACPO press release available at the time of writing) we learn the following regards ACPO's justification for its apparent change of position:

Tim Hollis, chairman of ACPO's drugs committee, said downgrading cannabis had sent out the wrong signals.

ACPO is also concerned about the number of cannabis "factories" that have sprung up across the country.

Mr Hollis said organised criminals now viewed the UK as a potential place to produce cannabis.

He said: "Some people are targeting the UK because they see it's financially worthwhile.

"We've got to increase the risk of being raided by the police and send a clear message out that cannabis is a drug, we do take it seriously, and we will tackle those people who try to trade in drugs."

Police say any reclassification would not necessarily change the way that they currently police possession of cannabis, although that may be reviewed in the light of any reclassification.

Mr Hollis said the emphasis should be on targeting dealers, rather than criminalising people who use cannabis recreationally.

Now the baffling part about this is that when the classification of cannabis was changed from B to C in 2004 there was also a change made to the status of all class C drugs, such that penalties for supply offenses were increased to parity with class B - incurring a maximum sentence of a hefty 14 years, and on that basis there is no reason why making cannabis B again should make the slightest difference in terms of deterrence to producers or dealers; penalties will be unchanged.

Indeed ACPO have been very specific in their January 2007 guidance on use of cannabis warnings where they state, underlined to emphasize the point:

Dealing in any amount of Cannabis is a serious offence that can result in up to 14 years imprisonment. A Cannabis Warning should not be considered where there is evidence of dealing or possession with intent to supply the cannabis to others.

Moreover, when the reclassification change was made, the police also insisted that possession of class C drugs be made an arrestable offense (it previously wasn't). From a policing perspective exactly the same enforcement options were available for possession (warning, caution, arrest, prosecution) after reclassification as before. Hollis specifically says that 'the emphasis should be on targeting dealers, rather than criminalising people who use cannabis recreationally.' Yet the change would not target dealers and will, in practical terms, serve only to increase penalties for 'people who use cannabis recreationally'. Its all a bit confusing.

A cannabis factory (BBC)

It is the decision of the individual police forces how they deploy their resources, and ACPO gave no indication that they were going to ease off cannabis dealing or production post reclassification even if their was a change regard small scale personal possession (something Hollis claims would not change anyway if there is a move back to B). So if they want to go in harder or put more enforcement resources into busting dealers and searching out and closing down 'cannabis factories' then that is their choice. Transform would argue it is a waste of time and valuable resources that is only likely to have negative consequences, but it certainly does not require reclassification if that's what they want to do.

There can, therefore, be no sensible justification for reclassification on policing grounds.

There is also no evidence, (literally none produced by the Home Office, ACPO or anybody else for that matter) that changes to a drugs classification have any impact on drug using decisions, or on the decision of any given criminal to enter the market or not. The evidence for classification changes 'Sending out the wrong message' (or any messages) is non-existent. To repeat: There is absolutely no evidence to show that the changes in the cannabis market toward domestic production (trends underway long before 2004) have anything to do with classification and everything to suggest classification is largely if not entirely irrelevant. The same can be said for levels of use - which have (according to the BSC and DoH surveys) been falling slowly but steadily for a number of years un-bothered by the classification changes.

The cannabis classification debate is almost entirely a symbolic and political one. It allows political point scoring in parliament and some moral grandstanding by self righteous newspaper columnists, but on the ground, in practical terms for the police its basically an irrelevance. It may save some time, but that is about it.

So you have to suspect that this ACPO announcement is similarly political rather than practical in nature. Maybe they are under pressure from Number 10 - as happened with support for the unfortunate Drugs Bill/Act of 2005. This wouldn't be much of a surprise given Prime Minister Brown has already declared that he plans to reclassify regardless of advice he receives. Or maybe they have just been swept up in the current spate of reefer madness, and its tabloid cheerleaders at the Daily Mail and Independent on Sunday? Who knows. It certainly isn't about shutting down cannabis factories.

Luckily, following the scrutiny of the Science and Technology Committee and the Lancet publication from key members of Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs Technical Committee (tasked to rank drugs according to relative harms) classification decision making has recently become a lot more transparent. It is, at least in theory, scientifically determined according to a 'harms matrix', and isn't decided by the police, by public consultation, by hysterical tabloid reporting, or by knee jerk politics.

If you are not yet bored witless by the cannabis reclassification debate, please see:

Cannabis reclassification revisited (Transform briefing to the ACMD 2005)

Cannabis reclassification (Transform briefing to the ACMD 2004)

Drug Classification Transform's submission to the 2006 Science and Technology Select Committee Inquiry into the drug classification system

Drugs prohibition is a 'policy of mass destruction' and the consultation document is a 'dodgy dossier'

.

Drugs prohibition is a “policy of mass destruction” and the consultation document is a “dodgy dossier”

News release
No Embargo
Date: Monday 22 October 2007

The Government's consultation on the last ten years of its drug strategy and its future, finished last week (Friday 19 October). As part of its submission Transform uses correspondence from officials, previously not in the public domain, to illustrate the Government's knowledge that its support for drugs prohibition creates significant harms. The submission can be read here (pdf)

The submission demonstrates how the Government:

• manipulated the entire consultation to close down genuine debate on drug policy
• set the framework in such a way as to have determined the outcome before the consultation had even finished
• ignored ten years of constant criticism of its drug policy
• hid internal reports critical of prohibition
• treats criticism of drug policy with disdain and contempt
• refuses to evaluate prohibition
• is a hostage to US inspired geopolitical forces
• uses drug policy for electioneering

This is despite the fact that the Government admits that prohibition itself is a significant cause of harm. In a letter to Transform's Director Danny Kushlick in Oct 2005, Foreign Office Minister of State the Rt Dr Hon Kim Howells MP wrote:

“Prohibition of course gives rise to illicit trafficking and use and a range of problems associated with those.”

And in a letter to Dr John Marks from the Home Office Direct Communications Unit in September 2007, they admitted that:

“…it is likely that there would be a reduction in acquisitive crime, if drugs were legalised…”

The implication of which is that the Government admits that prohibition creates acquisitive crime. Home Office estimates suggest that crime costs associated with prohibited drugs are about £15 billion a year.

The letter to Dr Marks goes on to say:

“The Government is aware of the arguments for legalising controlled drugs in a regulated way and has concluded that the disadvantages would outweigh the benefits.”

These deliberations on cost benefit analysis have never been made public and, suggest that “arguments” have taken precedence over evidence.

Transform's submission concludes that political parties will not engage in genuine debate and that it is up to individuals from every walk of life to challenge drug policy spin and debate the issue in their workplaces, professional bodies and social circles to avoid another ten years of self inflicted disaster.

Danny Kushlick, Transform Director, said:

“The consultation should have been a thoroughgoing review of the policy making process and the impact that policy has in the everyday world. In the event, it turned out to be a sham. The consultation document is another dodgy dossier. It contained no proposals, breaking one of the fundamental rules for consultations. The document was the most blatant propaganda we have yet seen to support ten more years of prohibition. During the process Gordon Brown announced that cannabis law would be changed and that drugs will never be decriminalised. Lastly, the Government targets were announced, predetermining that the entire framework for future policy development would be unchanged.

“We have an enormous amount of evidence now to show that the Government is in full possession of the facts that the policy of prohibition of currently illegal drugs is the significant driver for harms associated with their production, supply and use. Prohibition is a policy of mass destruction, from Afghanistan and Colombia to London and Liverpool. Transform's submission contains extracts from previously unreleased correspondence from the Foreign Office and the Home Office demonstrating that both departments admit that prohibition causes great harms but that neither are willing to contemplate change. This intransigence is despicable, given the level of chaos and misery associated with the illegal drug market. The correspondence quoted above demonstrates that Government drug policy is explicitly based upon claims to have won an “argument”, rather than evidence. Whilst Government uses primary school debating society rhetoric to decide its drug policy, huge swathes of the global population die or live in misery and degradation as a result.

“In the absence of political parties' willingness to enter into genuine debate, it falls to institutions and individuals outside of government to throw down the gauntlet. Significantly the press has played an enormously valuable role in raising a debate where Westminster has obstinately refused. We believe that this will remain the case for the foreseeable future, until the counterproductive forces of prohibition bring the criminal justice system to its knees and the general public is in possession of the facts and analysis to see through the propaganda that the Government uses to support the status quo.”

Ends

Notes for Editors

Transform's submission to the consultation

The letter from the Rt Hon Kim Howells MP can be seen here

The letter to Dr John Marks can be seen here

Transform launches our latest publication ‘After the war on drugs – Tools for the debate' at Portcullis House on Wednesday 24 October. For an invite please email jane@tdpf.org.uk or call 0117 941 5810

‘Drug Policy Unspun: Overwhelming failure' is a briefing produced by Transform to counter the propaganda in the Government's consultation document. It can be seen here