British police introducing new "warning" measures for cannabis possesion

Paladin

Saw this on Sky News today.
London police are going to introduce new reprimands for possession of small amounts of cannabis. Basically it will be taken off the person and they will be given a verbal warning.

The whole point is to reduce police time spent on minor offences. Normally if caught with possession of cannabis it would take them hours to arrest and process paperwork etc.
Now it takes like 2 minutes. Of course this is so they can spend more time going after "real" drugs like heroin.

Makes sense to me. Maybe Ireland will follow suit in a few decades.

Puck

Yeah in about 20 years time maybe. Although maybe we will be pleasantly surprised this time.

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John (yes THE John!)
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government."

[This message has been edited by Puck (edited 15-06-2001).]

JustHalf

I hope we don't follow Jack Straw's lead.

SHADOW

heh - yeah you could be right about the couple of decades thing Pal but I reckon that in even ten years there will be a vastly different view on the whole thing in Ireland.

If the increase in # smokers between us and our children is equivelant to the increase between our parents and us then attitudes should become alot more liberal towards it imho.

N

Oh yeah

..so the kids let off lightly with cannabis get the long haul later when the move up the ladder to herione?

What's the point?

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<A HREF="http://www.thegreensock.com

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Kali

Move up the ladder to heroin? Err yes.

And before this goes where I think its heading I suggest you take time to peruse

http://www.boards.ie/bulletin/Forum15/HTML/000252.html

and all its six pages of drug related debate

TwoShedsJackson

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Oh yeah:
..so the kids let off lightly with cannabis get the long haul later when the move up the ladder to herione?

What's the point?

</font>

Or they get busted now, put in jail, and have a much higher chance of being exposed to heroin.

DeVore

Drinking lead me to meths.
Frogger made me jaywalk and pacman made me obese.

I've known tons of people who've smoked joints for years and never tried anything harder.

I dont know anyone who smoked canabis and went on to hard drugs.

DeV.

"Fear is the product you push, well I'm a truth addict aw **** I got a head rush!" -- RATM.

DadaKopf

Yeah, I read about that a month or so ago - there was a provisional announcement by the Met police in the Guardian or somesuch. It's a great idea - one step towards legalisation and it's a lot more effective and fair than Anne Widdicombe's £100 on the spot fines.

If Britain pretends to be as 'tolerant' as it does, why not with hash? A relatively harmless drug.

TwoShedsJackson

Britain doesn't pretend to be particularly tolerant at the moment, in my opinion. Anne Widdicombe is a fascist anyway, a deeply religious woman, she actually converted to Catholicism so she could protest against women being ordained as priests.

DadaKopf

I dunno Castor, during the election, all you heard from the Conservatives, Lib Dems and Labour was the phrase "tolerant society", attempting to hark back to the 18th centure liberal (libertarian) agenda. I mean we all know how intolerant the English really are but the rhetoric all points towards this strand of 'tolerance' with an iron hand of the law - you're grand if you obey the law, unless you're an 'asylum seeker'.

Which is another thing. What is a genuine asylum seeker? Is it someone who has left their country legally due to persecution (which I reckon is rare) or is it someone who has fled their country illegally because of genuine terror and the aspiration to live a better life. If the latter is the case, then it's at odds with the first paragraph. The truth is that (in the liberal sense) everyone has a right to live a better life and the truth is that most asylum seekers are forced to flee illegally but when they get to Britain or Ireland etc., their credentials have to be confirmed as 'genuine asylum seekers' which seems to me a very flexible piece of political Catch 22.

Britain claims to be a 'tolerant' society but it's far from that.

yellum

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by DeVore:


I've known tons of people who've smoked joints for years and never tried anything harder.

I dont know anyone who smoked canabis and went on to hard drugs.


</font>

Unfortunately I do, but I think its more a psychological thing than anything. The person went from Alcohol to Canabis and Ecstasy to Heroin and Cocaine. When he couldn't get Heroin he used to inject horse tranquizers into his backside. He obviously needed to escape more than most other people.

If he didn't find hard drugs he would have ended up a wino or a glue sniffer.

I don't think verbal warnings should be brought in as its almost a way of giving in, and the only reason it seems to be brought in is to save man hours.

The laws the law and until general consensus gets it changed the law should be followed. If you want to break the law fine, just remember the consequences.

Its a bit silly though when u compare the effects that dope has on society and what alcohol has, yet alcohol is legal.

amp

I like hash. Afterwards I like cake.

IMO I think the general consensus does favour the legalisation of weed. But as we know our government does not always pay attention to what the population thinks.

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art is everything and of course nothing and possibly also a sausage

azezil

Thats only encourageing it ffs! the should crack down hard on em, i seen first hand where it can lead... imo there should be either large fines i.e. aprox £2000+ and or jail sentences!

N while u're at it, enforce curfues, marshall law... HA that'll but you capitalist scum in ur place

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Paladin

Im not sure if a majority would be in favour of legalising cannabis in Ireland yet. Lotto pre, or anti-60's free hippy love ppl around still. In England there almost certainly IS a majority. In a phone in vote on Sky news for example (not 100% accurate, but a useful example) there was a big majority in favour of the new liberal measures.

The thing is, legalisation will never become a political issue, because if a current politician made it his agenda he would be afraid (and rightly) of losing his seat. If a new canditate had it on his/her agenda they most likely would not win a seat in the Dail.
It will never be put to a referendum either because it doesnt require a constitutional change (I think?).

Bob the Unlucky Octopus

As Kali points out- we've had this debate before- at the link he's posted. My opinions on this are unchanged- the police have taken a step forward in dealing with the problem of hard drugs.

There is no international evidence that any soft-core drugs lead to hard drugs- ironically, that same soft--->hard spectrum argument was the main thrust behind provisos on prohibition- after all, once people became tolerant to alcohol they had to seek harder gratification right? Please...

It's worth remembering that this policy is only being trialled in Brixton, south London- not all over the UK- though it will be if successful. Medically speaking cannabis is far less harmful than all non-perscribed drugs- legal or otherwise. I am as in favor of legalization now as I was when we last had this debate- it will deny an illegal step-up procedure for dealers- and makes the police work a lot easier. That is what this thread should focus on- enforcement- that is the main thrust of the government's strategy- and a very astute one at that. Let's hope that other police forces begin to take the sensible, rather than the authoritarian attitude to a substance that is frequently perscribed for medical benefit.

Bob the Unlucky Octopus
=Vade Retro=

Oh yeah

... my earlier post was too absolute.

My opinion is that if people are allowed to smoke weed with only the fear of a verbal warning, why won't they? And that may lead to abuse of other, more dangerous substances.

On the other hand, people should have free will and the sense to make a choice that they are happy with.

I don't drink, in part because of the health risk, but mainly because it changes how you act, you can lose your restraints. Sometimes this is desireable, but in my experience it just makes me a more irritating person to be around, and I end up having less fun than when I'm sober and can think clearly.

Other people are fine when drunk and it's not a problem. My point in all this is, what stops me from doing drugs is not likely to stop many other people. If people are allowed to take whatever they want, then they may kill themselves (fine), but they may also injure other people. This is where I draw the line. I have no problem with people endangering themselves, it's up to them, but when they become a threat to others the situation changes.

TwoShedsJackson

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Oh yeah:

My opinion is that if people are allowed to smoke weed with only the fear of a verbal warning, why won't they? And that may lead to abuse of other, more dangerous substances.
</font>

We have definitely been over this ground before, however, people are smoking weed and indeed taking heroin and all other illegal drugs with considerably more at risk than a verbal warning.

The drug laws do not work properly, and police time and resources are wasted on busting marijuana users - like 92% of drug related arrests were for marijuana I believe.

LegacyUser

emm that is right its around that any way.But the thing that sickness me the most was a night we where in london and there was a so called night club that had police as door men and they serched every one comin in u no the score ciggy box's and all even had to open me mobile. So I went in and there is a dealer in side sells all he has to walks out and not a problem and why was he not touched because the police new him well. Thats the thing that makes me sick