MET PLAN TO EXTEND SOFTLY, SOFTLY DRUG SCHEME

Relaxed attitude towards minor offenders during cannabis project in Lambeth
saves police time and brings increase in arrests of dealers Secret plans to
roll out a controversial cannabis scheme across London are being drawn up
after a study found it saved officers and staff in one borough more than
2,500 hours and led to a 19% increase in arrests of class A drug dealers,
the Guardian can reveal.

A report into a six-month pilot project in Lambeth, south London, due to be
published next week, will show that a more relaxed attitude to policing of
the drug gave the borough the equivalent of two extra full-time officers.

Early analysis of a Mori poll of 2,000 people living in Lambeth has also
shown that the community supports the scheme.

The full results of the poll, which was commissioned by the Police
Foundation as part of its own review of the scheme, are expected to be
revealed at the end of the month.

Encouraged by the findings, the Metropolitan police commissioner, Sir John
Stevens, has asked a senior officer, deputy assistant commissioner Mike
Fuller, to draw up plans for rolling out the scheme to boroughs across the
capital.

The apparent success of the project and the favourable reaction of the
community will also bolster the position of the home secretary, David
Blunkett, who wants to press ahead with plans to reclassify cannabis from a
class B to a class C drug. This will mean that the police lose the power to
arrest people for simple possession.

Though the Police Federation said last month that the south London project
was being abused by drug users who were flooding into the area, Lambeth's
commander, Brian Paddick, is understood to be contempuous of the claim.

Fred Broughton, federation chairman, told a Home Office select committee
that there was anecdotal evidence from officers to suggest that the scheme
had not saved any time, yet the independent consultants who compiled the
report on behalf of the Met will say next week that this is not supported
by their findings.

All officers in Lambeth were asked to fill out a questionnaire about the
scheme, but only 6% of the local force bothered to do so. Senior Met
officers believe this shows that officers in Lambeth have few genuine
concerns about the impact of the scheme.

The Met introduced the initiative in Lambeth last July to reduce the time
spent processing minor cannabis offences so officers could focus efforts on
tackling crack cocaine and other class A drug users and dealers.

Under the scheme, people caught with cannabis are given on-the-spot
warnings, rather than being cautioned, arrested and possibly charged.

According to the study, a total of 1,350 hours of police officers' time
were saved in six months. It estimates that three hours was saved every
time a warning was issued instead of an arrest.

The report says that an additional 1,168 hours of police support staff time
was saved by not having to process cannabis prosecutions through the
borough's criminal justice unit.

The study found that officers seized more cannabis during the six months
than they did in the same period the year before.

Police believe that the rise is due to the increase in the number of
officers on the streets, and because the scheme offers "a practical
alternative to arrest or turning a 'blind eye'."

The number of arrests for dealing cannabis rose by 11% "suggesting dealers
found with larger amounts ... who are excluded from the warning scheme, may
have been targeted by officers".

Some officers interviewed for the report were worried that the reduction in
cannabis arrests meant that opportunities to gather intelligence on
suspects, such as DNA samples and fingerprints, were being lost.

A draft document, leaked to the Guardian, says the Met will argue that it
"has caught more people with cannabis, confiscated more cannabis and warned
more people for cannabis than ever before".