10.12.12
MPs say it is ‘now or never’ for drugs reform
The influential Home Affairs Select Committee wants the Government to back some decriminalisation of drug possession, where people found with small amounts of drugs are not always prosecuted.
The committee’s new report says “this is a critical, now-or-never moment for serious reform”, and urges a new Royal Commission into drugs policy.
The committee stopped short of supporting a relaxation of legal sanctions for drug use, as suggested by experts at the UK Drug Policy Commission in October.
The Home Office and Department of Health should take joint responsibility for drugs policy, and the Coalition should fund detailed studies of new systems in Washington and Colorado in the United States, where cannabis is being legalised, the committee suggested.
The report’s recommendations echo many of the findings of the committee’s last major inquiry into drugs in 2002 – when David Cameron, elected to Parliament the year before, sat on the committee – which called for a less punitive approach to cannabis and ecstasy.
The new report “regrets” the Government’s decision in 2008 to toughen the law on cannabis possession but only on the chairman's casting vote, after the issue split the committee.
The committee’s chairman, Keith Vaz MP, said: “We need to take the hysteria out of looking at drugs policy and look at two very important facts.
“First and foremost the victims – those who are the victims of those who deal in drugs and those who use drugs. And secondly the criminality of those in the system.
“We need to be pretty tough on those who go to prison and acquire the habit of using drugs in prison. We need to make sure we cut down on re-offending but we also need to look at other systems and monitor them carefully.
“After a year scrutinising UK drugs policy, it is clear to us that many aspects of it are simply not working and it needs to be fully reviewed.
“We cannot afford to kick this issue into the long grass. We have recommended that a Royal Commission be set up with an end-date of 2015.”
But a Home Office spokesperson said: “A Royal Commission on drugs is simply not necessary. Our cross-government approach is working.
“Drug usage is at its lowest level since records began and people going into treatment today are far more likely to free themselves from dependency than ever before.”
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