PEERS SUPPORT CANNABIS USE

The likelihood of cannabis being legalised for medical use increased
yesterday after a powerful Lords committee said it would be
"unjustified" and "inhumane" to delay clinical trials of the drug further.

Peers recommended an urgent change in the law to allow derivatives of
the drug to be used for the treatment of multiple sclerosis and
chronic pain. The 53-page report from the Lords' Science and
Technology Committee concluded an eight-month inquiry. It will put
pressure on the Government to relax the blanket ban on cannabis, which
has lasted for the past 25 years.

The Department of Health has always insisted evidence of the medical
benefits of cannabis was too weak to justify a relaxation of the law.

But the committee said that it has been persuaded that cannabis should
be moved from its listing as a Schedule 1 drug, where it cannot be
used except in research, to Schedule 2, allowing doctors and
pharmacists to supply it on prescription.

Lord Perry of Walton, the committee's chairman, said clinical trials
of cannabis should be mounted "as a matter of urgency for
compassionate reasons" as thousands of patients could be helped. "It
would be unjustified and inhumane to make them wait much longer," he
said.

The committee was less convinced about the drug's effectiveness in
tackling other conditions, including epilepsy, glaucoma and asthma,
but Lord Perry made clear it would be at doctors' discretion when to
prescribe the drug.

He denied the legalisation of cannabis for medical use would be the
first step towards the decriminalisation of the drug for recreational
use, saying they were "completely separate matters".

Lord Perry, who is 77, said: "Before any of you ask us if we have ever
smoked pot, the answer is that we're not going to tell you. It's not
relevant to the inquiry. But cannabis can be used to reduce the amount
of morphine or heroin that is used for terminal conditions like cancer."

Pulp Fiction glamorised drug-taking so much it may have increased
heroin abuse, the outgoing British Board of Film Classification
director, James Ferman, said yesterday. Some scenes in Quentin
Tarantino's cult film were "practically an advertisement" for heroin,
Mr Ferman told the Institute for the Study of Drug Dependence. "We
didn't cut the film, and I don't know, looking back, whether that was
a good idea," he said.

Checked-by: Patrick Henry