CANNABIS CAMPAIGN - COMPETITION WINNER

We challenged Britain's students to come up with an original contribution
to the decriminalise cannabis debate. The competition, arranged jointly
with the internet magazine, 'studentUK' , drew hundreds of lively
responses. The winning entry, published here, was written by Tim Samuels of
St Andrews University who takes the top prize of holiday flights worth #600
with the German airline, Lufthansa.

YOU wouldn't expect a Home Secretary to be deeply troubled by a rise in the
price of cannabis. After all, the current incumbent could move to allay any
resultant family disquiet by slipping his son a few more pennies in
pocket-money.

However, the rising cost is not in marijuana's street value, but in the
price being borne by a criminal justice system that has witnessed a
ninefold increase over the last decade in the number of cautions issued for
possession of the drug.

The latest figures (for 1995) reveal that more than 40,000 cautions were
made for basic unlawful possession - that is, possession without intent to
supply.

The Audit Office estimates that a caution costs in the region of #1,200 - a
startling figure made more comprehensible by the fact that each caution
involves a minimum of three police officers and associated administration.

It hardly requires Carol Vorderman to do the sums: it's costing around #48m
a year to caution people for personal possession of cannabis. Actual
prosecutions for possession, and the whole spectre of dealing, aren't even
part of this conundrum.

But is this #48m money well spent? Should decriminalisation of cannabis
just happen to remove the illegality of personal possession, what could
Jack Straw, let loose with #48m, fill his shopping trolley with?

Feeling altruistic, he may hand the money over to David Blunkett, who could
buy five shiny new secondary schools and seven primary schools - serving
6,000 children in all. A whip-round for another two million quid, and he
could get Frank Dobson a district general hospital.

Or if he was suffering from short-term memory loss - maybe William had made
pudding - Jack might forget his past as a paid-up member of parliamentary
Labour CND and lend George Robertson the cash to procure four Trident
missiles (warheads not included).

Should he want to keep the money for the Home Office, he could use the #48m
to put 2,826 bobbies on the beat. Or maybe, as a treat for the staff, he
could buy every police officer a 32-year subscription to Freemasonry Today.

Straw - of which he could purchase 72 million bales - might splash out
closer to home on a personal passion. The moolah would acquire the current
Blackburn Rovers squad - a snip at #21.5m - and leave enough change to
bring Shearer, Le Saux and Berg back to Ewood Park. Move over, Walker,
there would truly be a new "Uncle Jack" in town.

If none of these appealed, he could always take advantage of the
decriminalised status of cannabis: #48m could get Jack 16 tonnes of
hashish, about 32 cubic metres in dimension, which funnily enough would fit
snugly into The Body centrepiece of the Millennium Dome. Now there's a
cautionary tale.