CANNABIS 'NO LONGER REBELLIOUS'

The use of cannabis is so commonplace among British schoolchildren that it
is no longer regarded as an act of rebellion, the drugs tsar Keith Hellawell
admitted yesterday.

Addressing the Home Affairs Select Committee, Mr Hellawell said many
children did not even associate smoking cannabis with drug-taking.

"It's almost as if it has become marginalised," he said. "Everybody does it.
You are not actually beating the system and being a rebel or radical if you
are taking the substance."

In a frank exchange with MPs, Mr Hellawell, the UK's anti-drugs
co-ordinator, admitted that the Government's strategy for fighting drugs was
unlikely to show any signs of success within three years.

He said no community was safe from the growing problem of heroin use and
some youngsters were taking it as their first illegal drug. Although many
new heroin users have been introduced to the smokable form of the drug, some
young users were now choosing to inject heroin to satisfy their increasing
craving, Mr Hellawell said.

The drug tsar promised MPs that more of the UKP1.4bn spent annually on
fighting drugs would be allocated to education, which receives only 3 per
cent of the budget.

Mr Hellawell said ground had been lost by the reluctance of schools to take
on board anti-drug messages. He said: "Up to four or five years ago it was
taboo in schools to talk about drugs. It was outlawed by parents who said,
'If they are talking about drugs in school, it's a druggy school and I will
take my kids away'."