CODEINE TABLET LEAVES DRUG TEST MP WITH A HEADACHE

He is a Thatcherite favourite who once demonstrated his impeccable
rightwing credentials by describing cannabis-smoking contemporaries at
university as "inadequate, weedy souls".

But the former Conservative home office minister David Maclean almost
found himself on the wrong side of the law yesterday after failing a
voluntary drug test at a police conference.

Mr Maclean, who spent his ministerial career railing against the
dangers of drugs, declaring that they "ruined lives and communities",
lent his support to new drug testing equipment at the Police
Superintendents' Association conference by volunteering a urine sample.

But officers at the conference, who were delighted that such a
prominent figure had agreed to draw attention to their new equipment,
shuffled around in embarrassment when the results of the test showed
that traces of opiates - of which heroin and morphine are types - had
been discovered in Mr Maclean's sample.

Mr Maclean, who is never short of a soundbite, was momentarily
stumped. "My immediate reaction was 'Good Lord how can that be'," he
said.

But he soon regained his composure. "One of the experts on the stand
asked if I had been taking any codeine painkillers recently and the
answer was yes. I had taken some tablets the night before and he said
he assumed that's what it was."

Mr Maclean had taken a headache tablet on Tuesday night which showed
up in the test. But he will have to wait until a more detailed test of
his sample is carried out next week to clear his name.

Mr Maclean, a Scot who took over William Whitelaw's Cumbria seat in
1983, is one of the most outspoken Conservative rightwingers.

He was a hardliner at the home office even by the standards of his
then boss Michael Howard.

At the launch of one anti-drugs strategy in 1997 he said: "Drug taking
ruins lives and destroys communities. It is important that our society
does everything it can to protect everyone in Britain from the harm
caused by drug dealers."

A spokesman for the police superintendents' association rallied to Mr
Maclean's aid by praising him for volunteering for the test and saying
that he would be cleared by next week's more rigorous test.

The issue of drugs has become something of a taboo subject at
Westminster, with the two main parties competing with each other to
sound more hardline.

Jack Straw, who faced embarrassment himself when his son was caught
dealing drugs two years ago, will not countenance a debate on whether
to legalise soft drugs for medicinal purposes.

Only the Liberal Democrats say the issue of whether to legalise should
be debated. Soon after becoming leader, Charles Kennedy said that the
main parties should have the confidence to face up to the issue and
hold a debate.