LEGALISE CANNABIS HINT FROM MOWLAM

Mo Mowlam yesterday set herself at odds with Downing Street's hardline
anti-drugs policy when she held out the prospect that cannabis could
eventually be decriminalised.

Weeks after admitting that she smoked marijuana as a student in the
early 1970s, the minister in charge of the government's drugs strategy
said on GMTV: "I never cancel anything in or anything out."

Her remarks came after Keith Hellawell, the anti-drugs tsar, called on
police to concentrate on the threat posed by hard drugs rather than be
distracted by softer drugs.

In an interview with the Observer Mr Hellawell said: "What I have done
is lift the stone on the hidden truth about drugs in Britain, which is
that we need to discriminate between different drugs and the relative
harm caused and then talk openly about the difference we can make."

Ms Mowlam, the cabinet office minister, agreed that the government and
the criminal justice system were concentrating their resources on the
"killer drugs".

She said: "Obviously the killer drugs - heroin, cocaine, ecstasy - we
are focusing on harder. We have got a 10-year strategy ... It is not
going to happen overnight but we are making progress."

Ms Mowlam insisted that she was not calling for cannabis to be
decriminalised or for new laws to be introduced to allow offenders to
escape prison as proposed in a forthcoming report by the Police Foundation.

Ms Mowlam hinted that changes could be introduced at a later stage.
"At the moment there is no current intention so to do."

Her remarks came close to breaching the hardline stance of Tony Blair
and Jack Straw. Clare Short was famously rebuked when she raised the
possibility of decriminalising marijuana and it is no secret that
other ministers are sympathetic to a more flexible approach.

But the Tory leader, William Hague, provided a timely reminder
yesterday of why Downing Street has adopted such a tough stance. In an
in terview with BBC1's Breakfast with Frost, Mr Hague said he was
concerned by Mr Hellawell's remarks. "We shouldn't take our eyes away
from cannabis and the other soft drugs because it is very clear, from
talking to police around the country, that that often leads to the
hard drugs."

Mr Hague said that policies to be announced this week will call for
children to be taught of the dangers of illegal drugs through the
national curriculum and for anyone caught with drugs within 400 yards
of a school to be subject to heavier penalties. "There is a serious
crisis in this country [including] many parts where you wouldn't
expect it or suspect it".