GORDON BROWN PLANNING CLAMPDOWN ON CANNABIS OVER HEALTH CONCERNS

Cannabis is to be reclassified as a Class B drug after an official
review this spring, The Times has learnt.

Gordon Brown and Jacqui Smith are determined to reverse the decision
to downgrade the drug when the Advisory Council on the Misuse of
Drugs completes its report in the next few months.

While its recommendations are not yet known, ministers are already
making plain that the Home Secretary is prepared to overrule the
expert body if necessary.

Reclassifying cannabis as a Class B drug will mean that anyone found
in possession of the substance could face a five-year jail term and
an unlimited fine rather than a police warning and confiscation of
the drug. The penalty for supplying would remain the same, at a
maximum 14 years in jail and unlimited fines.

The advisory council, which rejected a previous attempt to reclassify
cannabis in 2006, has been told to take into account public attitudes
to cannabis as well as the medical evidence of its harm in reaching
its conclusion.

Ms Smith wants the council to acknowledge the signal that the
reclassification of cannabis from Class B to Class C in 2004 sent to
the public, including the perception that the drug was harmless and even legal.

"The sentiment from No 10 and the Home Office is very much towards
reclassification. It has to be as much about the message that is
being sent out as much as anything else," a senior Whitehall figure
has told The Times. The growth of super-strength "skunk", herbal
cannabis that is grown under lights, often by organised criminal
gangs, is strengthening ministers' resolve to restore its Class B status.

New evidence on the harm to mental health that smoking stronger forms
of cannabis can cause helped to prompt the latest review of the law
last autumn.

In her letter to Professor Sir Michael Rawlins, the chairman of the
council, requesting a further review of evidence, Ms Smith said:
"Though statistics show that cannabis use has fallen significantly,
there is really public concern about the potential mental health
effects of cannabis use, in particular the use of stronger forms of
the drug, commonly known as skunk. This is in addition to the
longitudinal studies undertaken in New Zealand and the Netherlands
that link cannabis use to mental health problems."

Suggestions that only the most potent forms of cannabis be
reclassified are rejected as impractical. Instead offenders may be
allowed to use evidence showing they were caught with milder forms of
the drug in mitigation, Home Office insiders contend.

Shortly after becoming Prime Minister Mr Brown signalled his desire
to reverse David Blunkett's 2001 decision to reduce cannabis to a
Class C drug that came into effect three years later.

"It is the message you send out. Why I want to upgrade cannabis and
make it more a drug that people worry about is that we don't want to
send out a message, just like with alcohol, to teenagers that we
accept these things."

The council makes recommendations to the Government on the control of
dangerous or otherwise harmful drugs, including classification and
scheduling under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. Its last review came
down against tightening up the penalties for using cannabis, saying
there was too little information about the pattern of use of
different strength cannabis products by users to change the law.

The council has recently been highly critical of parts of the
Government's consultation paper on the future of its drug strategy.
"It is disappointing that the paper makes no mention of needing to
improve the evidence base of drug misuse and treatments nor makes use
of international evidence, for informing and guiding policy," the council said.

The unpublished results of authoritative research into cannabis
confirm that the skunk now on sale in England is stronger than it was
a decade ago, but demolish claims that a new super-strength skunk,
which is 20 times more powerful, is dominating the market.

The two studies due to be published this year, which together
analysed nearly 550 samples of skunk seized by the police, both
conclude that the average content of the main psychoactive agent in
skunk strains of cannabis, THC, has doubled from 7 per cent in 1995
to 14 per cent in 2005.

Another dilemma for the Government in defending a decision to press
ahead with reclassification is that the latest figures from the
British Crime Survey suggest a long-term fall in cannabis use.
Figures from the 2006-07 survey estimate that 20.9 per cent of 16 to
24-year-olds used cannabis in the past year. However, there has been
a decrease between 1998 and 2006-07 among 16 to 59-year-olds in the
use of cannabis from 10.3 per cent to 8.2 per cent.

[sidebar]

BUZZWORDS: SMOKER'S CHOICE OF THE HIGHS AND LOWS

Afghan cannabis

This strain was imported from Afghanistan originally and bred
selectively in the Netherlands for indoor cultivation. It has a
strong, acrid aroma. The smoke is heavy with a strong, almost numbing buzz

Dutch dragon

The aroma is very citrus and sweet, similar to tangerines, as is the
taste. The buzz is a lasting, clear high that allegedly increases an
appetite for music and pleasure

Moroccan cannabis

This is generally of poor quality, with cannabis resin from Morocco
varying from a 2 per cent purity to about 8 per cent

Herbal cannabis

This is produced by drying the leaves and flowering buds of the
cannabis plant. It is smoked, usually with tobacco, in a spliff or joint

Skunk

A very potent variant of herbal cannabis, both in its mind-altering
effects and its aroma, it contains more tetrahydrocannabinol, the
main psychoactive agent in cannabis