Back-Off Cannabis Users Says Drug Tsar | United Kingdom

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Back-Off Cannabis Users Says Drug Tsar

The Government's drug tsar, Keith Hellawell, has called for a liberalization of the law on cannabis in a radical overhaul of the way the criminal justice system deals with drug offenders.
In an exclusive interview with The Observer , he said the Government and the police should concentrate on the fight against heroin and cocaine use and stop being distracted by cannabis. His comments, which were last night attacked as being 'defeatist', follow calls from the Liberal Democrats for a Royal Commission on decriminalizing cannabis use. Mo Mowlam, the Cabinet Minister who has admitted smoking cannabis in her youth, is thought to be sympathetic to a softening of the law.
Keith Hellawell is a former British police officer, who was the New Labour drugs advisor and so called "drugs czar" from January 1998. He resigned from his position in July 2002 over the government's reclassification of cannabis from a Class B to a Class C substance. Differences in opinion with the government over strategy towards tackling drugs were common during his tenure. In the position he was paid £106,057 a year.

Hellawell said: 'What I have done is lift the stone on the hidden truth about drugs in Britain, which is that we need to discriminate between different drugs and the relative harm caused and then talk openly about the difference we can make. The focus is going to be on the drugs that cause the major harm.'

He said the police were convicting too many people for the possession of small amounts of cannabis to hit the drug crime targets.'By far the greater proportion of arrests are for cannabis and I am looking for a change on that. I am looking for a shift towards those dealing in heroin and cocaine.'

Although he said new legislation would not be needed, his comments will be seen as an attempt to reform the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act by the back door. Under the Act, the possession of cannabis is a criminal offense punishable by prison.

His comments angered Ann Widdecombe, the shadow Home Secretary. 'What we need is a clampdown on the possession of cannabis,' she said. 'Hellawell is completely wrong. We should be looking at a zero tolerance policy.'

He said: 'Successive Conservative governments said the solution to the drug problem lay with the criminal justice system. Now funds are being shifted into treatment and education.'

His comments chime with the findings of a Police Foundation report on the 1971 Act to be published next month. The committee is set to recommend withdrawing prison sentences for possession of cannabis and taking ecstasy off the list of Class A drugs.

Hellawell added: 'The report will be a another step towards facing up to the reality of the situation. They are grappling with many of the issues we are taking care of.'

By Guardian Unlimited © Copyright Guardian Newspapers 2008

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