MOOD CHANGES AS MPS BREAK RANKS

The mood on cannabis legalisation has been transformed. After 30
years of imperceptible progress, two ex-cabinet ministers have backed
the idea within a week. Yesterday it was Peter Lilley.

Last Sunday Mo Mowlam, who as Cabinet Office minister was responsible
for drug policy until the election, called the current level of
debate "a farce".

She said there was confusion and hypocrisy when police in Brixton
adopted a low-key approach while other forces applied the law, and
when court penalties varied widely. She called for the wholesale
legalisation and regulation of the cannabis trade.

Three years ago, even to admit to youthful experiments with dope was
a passport to newspaper shame. There was media excitement when a Tory
backbencher, David Prior - son of former cabinet minister Jim -
confirmed that in his 20s he had found cannabis "relaxing".

When the Liberal Democrat conference voted for a royal commission,
the leadership was furious at the embarrassment.

But the mood was changing. The survey that uncovered Mr Prior's past
also found that two-thirds of MPs wanted a royal commission. The
government promised to review the use of the drug for therapeutic
purposes.

In March last year the Police Foundation published the results of its
own inquiry, chaired by Lady Runciman. It found that penalties for
possessing cannabis did more damage that the drug itself and said
people should no longer be sent to prison for possession.

But the government flatly rejected the findings, saying it had "a
clear and consistent view about the damage which drugs can cause to
individuals, their families and the wider community, the link between
drugs and crime, and the corresponding need to maintain firm
controls".

Less than a year ago Ann Widdecombe, the shadow home secretary, used
the Tory party conference to call for a policy of zero tolerance
towards cannabis use. But her initiative rapidly turned out to be a
solo mission, greeted with derision - and the admission from several
shadow cabinet ministers that they had indulged.

This year a House of Lords committee called for research into
cannabis use to be speeded up.

Mr Lilley's call for legalisation moves the campaign, which has been
slowly gathering pace for nearly 10 years, into a different league.

A Commons motion calling for "cannabis cafes" got just 25 signatures
last year. But its sponsor, the Labour MP Paul Flynn, believes the
Brixton experiment is de facto legalisation.

Simon Hughes, the Lib Dem home affairs spokesman, welcomed Mr
Lilley's pamphlet and announced a policy review for the autumn: "We
will be looking at all aspects of drugs policy in a wide-ranging,
no-holds- barred report."

- -- "Marijuana's relative potential for harm to the vast majority of
individual users and its actual effect on society does not justify a
social policy designed to seek out and firmly punish those who use
it." - National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse, 1972 (USA) --
Shug http://www.ukcia.org - The UK Cannabis Information Website
http://www.lca-uk.org - The Legalise Cannabis Alliance