TORY MP CALLS FOR CANNABIS REFORM

A Conservative MP has admitted that he smoked cannabis as a young man and a
new survey suggests he is not the only politician to have done so.

David Prior, the son of former Cabinet minister James (now Lord) Prior,
said: "Yes, I did inhale".

Writing in the Independent on Sunday, which has been campaigning for the
legalisation of the drug, the North Norfolk MP said the current law was
"hypocritical and dishonest".

He wrote: "I associate my experience with drugs (soft ones) not with Mick
Jagger or Aldous Huxley but with passing my law degree and working in a bank.

"But that was a long time ago. I stopped some time in my late 20s and took
up alcohol instead."

Mr Prior said he wanted to see a royal commission set up to review the law
in a "detached, informed and objective way".

The Prime Minister Tony Blair and the Home Secretary Jack Straw - the
latter whose teenage son was cautioned for cannabis possession in January -
are both staunch opponents of legalisation.

Mr Straw told BBC Radio 4's The World This Weekend that the experience of
other countries was that legalisation did not work: it was greatly
disruptive of society.

He said it was valid to differentiate between "so-called soft drugs" such
as cannabis and hard drugs such as cocaine, which did much more damage. But
there was a risk of escalating drug use.

The government would study carefully the results of existing Parliamentary
and police inquiries into drug use, he said.

However, the results of a survey suggest that most of the new crop of MPs
are more sympathetic to Mr Prior's position.

Of the 243 MPs elected for the first time last year, 22.5% told researchers
for the Jonathan Dimbleby programme on ITV that they had tried illegal
drugs. Slightly more than half the MPs, who almost all answered on
condition of anonymity, thought the current law was too harsh.

The idea of a royal commission was supported by 64%.

The newspaper quoted Labour MP Paul Flynn, who is campaigning for a change
in the law, hailing the survey's results as "splendid news and very
surprising."

"In effect it means that the current prohibitionist policies in this
country are doomed," he said.