From: [m m pb 3] at [central.susx.ac.uk] (Stuart Marker)
Newsgroups: alt.drugs
Subject: U.K. Newspaper Article on drug legalisation
Date: 8 Jun 1994 11:45:39 GMT

The following article was printed in the Guardian newspaper, Wednesday
June 8. The Guardian is a left of centre broadsheet and is about as
liberal as the mainstream papers get in Great Britain. 

Hope people find this interesting. --------   Stuart.


Duncan Campbell wrote:

CAN THE LAW FINALLY GRASP THE POPPY?

The police are taking the lead by staging a refreshingly realistic
debate on drugs.


In 1928 a group of young army officers "disgusted by the degenerate
parasites of the West End" and, in particular "dope peddlers and other
crooks" were reported by the News of the World to have taken the
miscreants to the outskirts of London where they flogged them until they
promised to mind their ways.

They were apparently following up a suggestion made by the writer Cyril
McNeilie-Sapper, author of the Bulldog drummond books-  in an army mess
shortly before he died that "young men of energy" should form themselves
into gangs to deal with the drugs menace. The NoW reported that this
idea had strick a chord with the young officers because one of their
number had recently broken off his engagement as his fiancee had become
addicted to marijuana:"she is going to these cigarette orgies. It will
be years before she is well."


Nearly 70 years later, the country's most senior police officers are
meeting in Wakefield to take part in what is likely to be the most
far-reaching discussion they have ever hosted on drugs. Among the
previously unthinkable thoughts on the agenda are legalisation,
decriminalisation and the licensing of drugs. The conference will be
addressed by the secretary general of Interpol, Raymond kendall, who has
already expressed his doubts about current drugs legislation, Lord
Mancroft, a member of the All-Party Misuse of Drugs Group, whose theme
is the need for alternative solutions and Keith Hellawell, chief
constable of West Yorkshire whose remarks on Panorama about the eventual
possibility of legalisation restarted the current debate.


But it was not so much Hellawell's comments on legalisation byt what he
had to say about the reasons people take drugs that were significant:
"(people) are not being honest about the positive side of drugs, that
drugs do give people a good feeling." 

At last a senior public figure was acknowledging that people take drugs
for pleasure, either because, as Hellawell went on to say, they get a
"buzz" from them or because they need, as one drugs doctor puts it, a
"chemical walking stick." Previously, the official attitude has been
that people who took drugs must be weak, mad, bad or suicidal bacause
everyone knew drugs did harm, caused addiction and led to death.

The Government, the police and  the judiciary - many judges don't know the
difference between the various drugs - cooperated in this fiction and
were aided until recently by journalists happy to endorse a world of
"ciggarette orgies'." As a result, a debate on drugs far removed from
reality has ensued.

On the one side were those who propose jail sentences of 25 years and
on the other were the masses who found some of the warnings risible. The
downside, of course, was that the genuine dangers and real risks of
drugs were equally discounted. With Hellawell's acceptance of reality,
there is now a chance for a proper debate.


It is significant that the police are staging the debate: traditionally
they have lagged behind parliament on social issues. But where is the
political discussion? When has there been a grown-up discussion on dugs
in the Commons or Lords? None of the major political parties have shown
great courage or imagination.

Tony Newton is now heading a cabinet sub-committee looking into drugs
policies in relation to crime, punishment and education. It has yet to
report but Michael Howard, who addresses the police tommorow has shown
little inclination for any radical initiatives. His deputy, Daved
Maclean, has vilified drug-takers in the Commons and at a time when
people were being shot regularly on the street as a result of crack
cocaine dealin rows, Mr Howard announced a five-fold increase in fines
for possessing cannabis.

Tony Blair, who has had the opportunity to advance the debate, gas so
far failed to do so in any significant way. The lefy-of centre Institute
for Public Policy Research published a pamphlet last month suggesting a
decriminalisation of cannabis experiment but the Labour Party remains
officially opposed to any moves. The Liveral-Democrats disowned their
Scottish organisation when it voted for decriminalisation but have
offered nothing of note to the debate. Almost all politicians subscribe
to the conventional wisdom that to talk of legalisation would be
plitical suicide.

In prisons, police cells, hospitals, schools, ther are walking examples
of the failure of the current drugs policies. Yet there is a terror
amongst politicians about tackling the issue, grasping the poppy, trying
to find out why piople indulge. Instead, there is talk of a "war on
drugs", a futile war, as Commander John Grieve of  the Metroplitan
Police said recently, because it would essintially be a civil war.

In some ways the drugs debate parallels the one on Northern Ireland.
Again, there has been an unspoken cross-party agreement to do little and
hope that it would go away. Although Northern Ireland and drugs are two
of the most expensive bills the country has to pay, both were left
virtyally undiscussed at the last election.

Now at last the police are to debate the law on drugs.