I recently had a very pleasant visit to the country's first cannabis cafe - The Dutch Experience, in near-by Stockport. The atmosphere was relaxed, friendly and welcoming. Despite the legal grey area the cafe operates in, and the high profile arrest of the cafe's founder, Colin Davies, the cafe has remained open since September of last year and is proving to be a huge success. With around 12 other cannabis cafes due to open around the country, hopefully it shouldn't be too long before one opens in Oldham. [continues 71 words]
How refreshing to read Robert Sharpe's letter about the abject failure of Britain's drug policies (February 26) Many of Robert's sentiments were echoed in last year's report on the Misuse of Drugs Act by the Police Foundation (the Runciman report), the recommendations of which were flatly rejected by our misguided Government, despite being modest in their scope for drug law reform. It is no coincidence that countries like Britain and the United States, who have the most repressive cannabis laws, also have the worst drug problems. Until such time as prohibition and punishment are replaced by regulation and harm reduction, Britain's drug policy will continue to fail at both national and local level. [continues 100 words]
The news that Oldham is to have its very own drug tsar from April is an interesting development in drug policy. Even more interesting is that this will be a political appointment, an existing councillor no less. So who will the drug tsar be? More importantly, who is to decide who gets the job? I suggest that the tsar be directly elected by the public of Oldham, possibly through the local area committees. This would make the tsar more acountable to the people of Oldham and, hopefully, more accurately reflecting the public's views on drug policy. Certainly the last thing Oldham needs is an Anne Widdecombe style zero-tolerance zealot in the post. We shall see. GO DUTCH [end]
You have to wonder just what the drug tsar, Keith Hellawell, has been smoking when he claims that the government's anti-drug effort is working (Jan 4th). I would hardly call an increase, albeit small, in the number of schoolchildren trying cannabis to be evidence of a successful drug policy. According to last years annual report from the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, Britain has more cannabis users than any other country in Europe and more problem drug users per capita of any major European country bar Italy. Some success. [continues 111 words]
