MANY QUESTIONS STILL TO BE ASKED

PAUL Whitcher's letter rebutting cannabis reclassification (Drugs must get
zero tolerance, Wednesday, July 17) said: "Labour had three years to send
out a strong defining message to children and ill informed adults, that the
use of cannabis is harmful to health and morally wrong."

It is unclear in what sense he means cannabis use is inherently immoral. It
is immoral to tell self-serving lies, to shout at your spouse, to belittle
friends or betray a confidence - but none of these are the kind of thing
that the criminal law has any business prohibiting.

Mere immorality (as apposed to imprudence) is not sufficient warrant to
justify criminalising cannabis use. Nor, is the fact that cannabis use may
be potentially dangerous a good enough reason to criminalise cannabis use
or else we would have to jail all car drivers, skiers, and clumsy people.

These actions are not the kind of thing that the criminal law has any
business prohibiting.

A law whose purpose is a deterrence must always be backed by a
demonstration that the law is just. Therefore the basic question we must
addressed in any attempt to evaluate our cannabis policy is whether
cannabis use is the kind of thing for which punishment is appropriate and
whether the punishments meted out are proportionate to the gravity of the
crime are justice or not?

My questions to Mr Whitcher and other (ill informed) supporters of the
Conservative party policy to criminalising cannabis use (zero tolerance) are:

- - How does criminalising cannabis make it less harmful to grow or use?

- - How does locking up adult cannabis users - deter young people using it?

- - If your son or daughter were arrested for cannabis possession, how long
should they go to prison for?

Don Barnard

Press Officer

Legalise Cannabis Alliance PO Box 198 Norwich NR3 3WB