REMEMBERING THE VICTIMS OF CANNABIS

THOSE who kid themselves that the trade in cannabis is a victimless
crime should take a long hard look at the experience of those forced
to work in it.

Trafficked into Britain in search of a better life, illegal Vietnamese
immigrants are kept in squalid houses where they farm the drug on an
industrial scale to pay off their 'debt' to those who brought them
here.

It means drug production no longer happens hundreds or thousands of
miles away, it happens right here. On our doorstep. Under our noses.

In doing so, the drug lords are simply following the business model of
any industry by moving the point of production to the point of
consumption.

If there wasn't the demand for it they wouldn't be here.

And the fact that police in West Yorkshire closed down 215 cannabis
farms in the first six months of this year alone shows demand for the
drug is sky high.

Officers say they're determined to make the region a hostile
environment for those who cultivate cannabis commercially and we pray
they succeed.

All too often these shadowy figures are linked to organised crime and
the last thing we want is for West Yorkshire to become a breeding
ground - either for cannabis or for those who grow it.