BLUNKETT SAYS DRUGS PROPOSAL IS A GAMBLE

DAVID BLUNKETT admitted to MPs yesterday that his proposal to downgrade
cannabis to a class C drug, which met only muted protests in the Commons,
was a gamble.

The Home Secretary said: "There are not any certainties in dealing with
drugs policies. If there were, we would have found them. And if (we had) I
would be a lot less modest than I am this afternoon in putting forward the
policy."

His comments, with a note of exasperation, came after Kate Hoey (Lab,
Vauxhall) asked him whether he was certain that in ten or 20 years his
announcement would not come to be viewed as "the one where we got it
wrong". Ms Hoey said the police experiment in Lambeth, South London, of
warning rather than arresting cannabis-users projected the message that
cannabis was "OK" and had led to more drug-dealers and people using
cannabis in the area.

Mr Blunkett said there was doubt over her claims, but it was a fact that
dealing in class A drugs and street crime had both fallen by 10 per cent
during the period.

Oliver Letwin, the Shadow Home Secretary, attacked the reclassification of
cannabis as a "muddled and dangerous policy" that sent confused messages to
the public and would do nothing to reduce drug use or criminality. There
were serious arguments for legalising, licensing and taxing cannabis or for
greater efforts to lead young people away from it, Mr Letwin said. "Instead
he has given control over cannabis to the drug-dealers with the police
turning away."

Mr Letwin, whose relations with the Home Secretary are usually cordial,
accused him of setting out to wrong-foot opponents and of buying off
libertarians with a more liberal approach, yet appeasing the anti-drugs
lobby by raising sentences for dealing.

Simon Hughes, for the Liberal Democrats, whose policy is to legalise
cannabis, supported its reclassification but said it was confusing that
cannabis use would remain an arrestable offence where it was deemed a
public order matter.

Government backbenchers including Chris Mullin (Lab, Sunderland South),
Dari Taylor (Lab, Stockton South), Brian Iddon (Lab, Bolton South East) and
Tony Lloyd (Lab, Manchester Central) urged further relaxation of
prescriptions to heroin addicts.

Peter Lilley (C, Hitchin and Harpenden), one of the first Tories to have
advocated the legalisation of cannabis, criticised the policy. He said:
"Surely steps to effectively depenalise the use or possession of cannabis
at the same time as retaining or reinforcing penalties on its supply will
do nothing to reduce demand for cannabis while continuing to drive
soft-drug users into the arms of hard-drug providers."

Earlier, Iain Duncan Smith and Tony Blair clashed over policy on cannabis
for the second week in succession at Prime Minister's Questions. The
Conservative leader said that the reclassification of cannabis was being
announced without proper debate or evidence and pointed out that Keith
Hellawell, the Government's former drugs czar, had said in resigning that
the move sent out the wrong message.

Mr Blair said there were differences of opinion on all sides and within the
community in Lambeth, but said it was absurd to say that this was being
proposed without consultation.