Blunkett gambleswith our children
The Sun 11 July 02
by george pascoe-watson
Deputy Political Editor
DAVID Blunkett last night admitted he is taking a giant gamble with Britain’s children by effectively legalising cannabis.
The Home Secretary ruled dope smokers WON’T be arrested.
They will be merely ticked off and have their drugs confiscated.
Mr Blunkett is downgrading cannabis to a Class C substance so police have more time to combat heroin and crack. The worry is more kids will turn to pot.
Furious Labour MP Kate Hoey accused him of risking the future of the nation’s youth, saying: In ten or 20 years’ time, are you certain that you will not look back on this day as the one when you got it wrong?
Mr Blunkett conceded the change was a gamble during stormy Commons exchanges. He said: There are no certainties when dealing with drugs policies. If there were, we would have found them by now.
He decided to reclassify cannabis as Class C despite fierce opposition from the Government’s own drugs czar Keith Hellawell.
Ex-chief constable Mr Hellawell made his feelings clear hours earlier by announcing he had quit.
Under historic changes, police will hand out fixed-penalty tickets to persistent dope users.
People caught smoking the drug in the street will effectively be let off with a caution.
An experiment in Kate Hoey’s constituency in Lambeth, South London, where officers turn a blind eye to cannabis, will be expanded across the capital within weeks.
The new approach will be nationwide by October. Miss Hoey said drug dealing and cannabis use had shot up since the Lambeth experiment began.
She fumed: The message going out to families across the country is very stark and uncomfortable.
Shadow Home Secretary Oliver Letwin said: This is a muddled and dangerous policy. Why, if he is effectively decriminalising cannabis, does he still want people to buy their cannabis from criminals?
And Tory MP Andrew Lansley said: There will be more opportunity for dealers interested in moving people from cannabis to harder drugs.
Home Office officials insisted Mr Blunkett was NOT going soft.
They said seven out of ten drugs convictions were for dope and that police should concentrate on hard Class A substances.
A new offence of peddling outside schools will be brought in. And the maximum sentence for dealing in cannabis will be increased from five years to 14.
A cop in drug-plagued Brixton said: We see a lot of kids smoking pot. Before, we could arrest them and get them to speak to a referral worker now we can’t.
Dope trade
in the open air
By SARA NATHAN
On the streets of Brixton
A TRIO of men sat huddled together in the pouring rain looking furtively about as they passed around a sodden joint. It was only ten in the morning and the air was ripe with the smell of cannabis.
Nervous mums hurriedly walked past the small leafy square with their tots in pushchairs.
This was the scene in Brixton, South London, yesterday a few hours before David Blunkett announced the downgrading of cannabis.
I walked down bustling Brixton High Street to the cries of skunk and dope as traders peddled their wares.
Outside KFC where the toilets are locked to stop people injecting drugs a youth of 18 strolled up.
Dressed in a yellow string vest and black baggy trousers, he grinned broadly and said loudly: Skunk man, the finest.
Just yards away police officers, clad in black bullet proof vests, were patrolling.
Opposite Lambeth Town Hall, deadbeats sipped cans of lager and beer.
Tim Summers, 54, lit up a joint as I stood by. He is secretary of Cannabis Action London and smokes up to 40 joints a week.
He said: There’s so much weed around here that they’d have to get a special cannabis squad to stop it being sold.
Mum Nic Elborn, 32, walked past with her three-year-old-daughter Holly.
Nic, of neighbouring Herne Hill, said: I don’t want my little girl anywhere near drugs.
It’s a big problem and I don’t see how downgrading cannabis will solve it.
Back on the green, police were questioning a suspect. As I watched, a man sidled up and tried to sell drugs to me.
Drug users, dealers, cops and deadbeats … just a typical day in Brixton.
