SERIES: DRUGS UNCOVERED: THE LEGAL LANDSCAPE

I have a better idea of what would happen to me if I were caught with
cocaine in Saudi Arabia than in a West End nightclub. The drugs laws
in this country are not particularly clear, because they're
infrequently enforced. Every now and then someone - a Home Secretary
or a police chief, most often - will stick his or her head up and say
that one drug or another is to be added to the list of controlled
substances, or that the penalties for using them should be stiffer.
But what does it all mean?

Confusion surrounds cannabis, for instance. Public (and scientific)
opinion has shifted from seeing it as hippy 'weed' towards thinking of
it as stronger 'skunk', which has been linked to psychosis. Skunk is,
in fact, more widely available than it used to be. So last month, the
government published its response to the latest research from the
Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs. In her introduction to the
document, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith says that in order to suggest
that it's 'not a safe drug to take', the government has decided to
classify cannabis as a class B rather than a class C drug. It was
downgraded from class B to class C by Smith's predecessor, David
Blunkett, only four years ago.

Cannabis aside, here is a guide to the legal landscape now. All
controlled substances are classed as either A, B or C. As the Home
Office website explains, 'Class A drugs are considered to be the most
likely to cause harm.' These are ecstasy, LSD, heroin, cocaine, crack,
magic mushrooms and amphetamines prepared for injection. If you're
caught with them in your back pocket, you can be fined an unlimited
amount of money, and put behind bars for up to seven years. In real
terms, with the exception of people caught in police drug operations,
people are infrequently charged, and a first offence leads almost
always to an official caution to save police and court time. However,
dealing class A drugs is taken more seriously and the maximum sentence
is life imprisonment.

Being charged with supplying drugs has nothing to do with making money
out of it: if you pass some to a friend, you can be arrested. So it
comes down to a question of quantity, as it does with the offence of
'intent to supply', which depends entirely on having more than a
person could be expected to want for himself. The estimates given by
police are on the conservative side: a couple of ounces of cannabis is
enough, according to one officer; or three ecstasy pills.

Possessing class B drugs - amphetamines (such as speed), Ritalin,
pholcodine and soon cannabis - without a prescription can land you in
prison for five years; dealing them for 14 years.

Class C drugs include ketamine and other tranquillisers, some
painkillers and the rave/date-rape drug GHB. Possession without a
prescription carries a two-year jail penalty; supply without a
licence, 14 years.

Glass of wine, anyone?