Your Driffield Councillors

Back in November, Cllr Symon Fraser submitted a motion to Full Council following the decision by Central Government to reclassify cannabis from a Class B to a Class C drug.   This reclassification was felt to give the wrong message to our young people.  Below in full is not only the Motion but his speech to Council.   We would be interested in hearing your views if you have the time to read what we feel.   Cllr Temple is a member of the Driffield Drugs Action Forum, which is committed to helping young people avoid, cope with under supervision or come off drugs completely.  We are fully supportive of the work the Forums and our own Drugs Action Teams do in this field. 

You will hopefully be pleased to hear that we won the motion, although there were many members of the Liberal Democrats who could not vote with us, and when pushed to stand up and be counted at a recorded vote simply abstained from supporting us.

The Motion   “That this Council fully supports the Hull and East Riding Drugs Action Team in its efforts to protect the community from the scourge of illegal drugs and that this support extends to the full endorsement of the DAT position on opposing the reclassification of cannabis.”

Talk to any parent or grandparent about their fears, you will find that the fear of helplessly watching a child or grandchild slip into the hell hole of drugs dependency is a real fear and one which they genuinely dread.

And yet we are in danger of sending out a message that cannabis is OK .

In the war on drugs the “Drugs Action Team” are our front line. If we are serious about our commitment to do our best to protect our communities then we must support of them in their efforts to pull together all the agencies involved in the battle.

The dealers and pushers will pick up on any opportunity to increase their business and the current moves to re-classify cannabis are just such an opportunity.

I use the misconceptions about cannabis reclassification to illustrate my point and I ask you to make up your own mind as to what message you will send out to young people in the East Riding of Yorkshire.

Common misconceptions about cannabis.

1. “Cannabis is so common that the current laws are unworkable.”

Only a small percentage of the population has ever used illegal drugs and it is an even smaller number of people currently use illegal drugs.

The fact that some people break a law does not mean that it's a bad law.

Which of us never breaks a speed limit? Yet the speed limits still moderate peoples driving behavior, they still set what is acceptable, they still offer protection to the vast majority.

It’s in just this same way the current drugs laws and cannabis classification set a boundary which the vast majority of people accept as wise.

2. "Cannabis is harmless."

Simply not true, smoked without a filter and retaining the inhalant for longer a cannabis user lays down more tar in his lungs than with ordinary cigarettes. It also interferes with normal brain functions (well it would wouldn't it, that's why people smoke it). So it has all the health threats of tobacco with a few choice added problems all of its own, like memory impairment, weakened immune system, heightened activity of schizophrenia type disorders.

3. "Taking cannabis is a victimless crime."

Wrong, I've just talked to you about how it can cause damage, so surely we can all accept that you cannot cause damage without producing a victim. Add to this the possible victims of drugged driving accidents and of passive smoking. I can accept that perhaps of all drugs cannabis is the least linked with criminal activity in order to satisfy demand and pay for it, but victims there certainly are.

4. "Cannabis is not a gateway drug."

Research has shown that use of cannabis can be the gateway to lead on to harder drug use.  Dealers see cannabis users as tomorrow's customers for the big margin products, the crack cocaine and heroin.

Expecting a dealer not to try to move a user on from cannabis to a harder drug is like expecting a poacher only to take little fish out of the river, when a big one swims by he'll give it a try.

The most worrying are the figures that show that child users of cannabis are 85 percent more likely to become hard drug users than their non-cannabis using friends, so make no mistake, cannabis can be the open door to hard drugs.

5. "Cannabis is not as dangerous as tobacco or alcohol"

Wow! What a endorsement, it's not as dangerous as the worlds biggest contributor to lung disease and heart problems well I'll sleep easy tonight with that recommendation.

Add to this the dangers of drugged driving and you begin to doubt which takes the prize for least dangerous.

Today's cannabis drug is vastly changed from the "hippy, flared trouser and flowery shirt" image of the Woodstock era. Today's drug can be up to 15 times stronger than the drug of yesteryear. There may have been a day when the dangers were less significant, but, today it’s dangerous, believe me.  

6. "Legalise the drug to overcome the dealers."

Well if you believe that you do not understand dealing, they will still be pushing cocaine and heroin, cannabis will still be seen by them as the “introducer”, the “special offer” the bait on the hook of hard drugs. The evidence shows that far from protecting young people from hard drugs, easing the laws is more likely to bring them into contact with the pushers.

7. "The law has lost touch with the public."

Yes I accept that there are people who are further away from harmony with the law, people who mamby pamby about extoling the “should be free to consenting adults story” but by far the greater majority of the public remains in favour of maintaining levels of protection from drugs.

Now after almost 100 years, we know the dangers of tobacco, we know the disease and harm that it leads to. We cannot turn the clock back and make tobacco illegal now, it is too deeply established in the world, but we do have a duty not make the same mistake with cannabis.

There are other dangers of reclassification, these centre on the altered perceptions of the drug.

"It's being reclassified, so it must be safe" 

"If cannabis is safe then so must be glue and solvents and other substances."

"It's safe for adults so it's ok for me"

"Look at me I'm smoking pot I must be grown up".

Now you are lucky, whatever decision you make today, whichever way you vote you will not change the classification of cannabis. You are not an MP, you will not be making or changing the laws.

But you do have a role to play.  When you face today's young people in twenty years, when some of them may be addicted to hard drugs and suffering from chronic lung disease will you be able to say “I tried, I did all I could to stop them taking away that protection.”

One of our catch lines of the thrust to protect children from drugs, is "Just say NO to drugs" and yet what does reclassification say? Clearly it weakens the message and thus dilutes the work of not only our DAT but also teachers and health staff who are working to reinforce the "just say NO message".

But the message that we send out does matter, it matters that we are clear about drugs and the threats they bring.

I live in a real world where I know that pot is widely used and that much of that use is by otherwise law abiding young people who live and work in our community. But that should not detract from the protection we offer to that same community or the commitment we make to helping to control the scourge of drugs.

So vote for this motion and send out a clear message about the world we want for our young people a world where the risks are explained and the message is clear that cannabis and drugs do you harm and the cool thing to do is "say No to drugs".