Guardian UK: Decriminalise drug use, say experts after six-year study

[RainDog]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/oct/15/decriminalise-drug-use-say-experts?newsfeed=true

A six-year study of Britain's drug laws by leading scientists, police officers, academics and experts has concluded it is time to introduce decriminalisation.

The report by the UK Drug Policy Commission (UKDPC), an independent advisory body, says possession of small amounts of controlled drugs should no longer be a criminal offence and concludes the move will not lead to a significant increase in use.

The experts say the criminal sanctions imposed on the 42,000 people sentenced each year for possession of all drugs – and the 160,000 given cannabis warnings – should be replaced with simple civil penalties such as a fine, attendance at a drug awareness session or a referral to a drug treatment programme.

They also say that imposing minimal or no sanctions on those growing cannabis for personal use could go some way to undermining the burgeoning illicit cannabis factories controlled by organised crime.

[factsarenotfair]

1. Checked out real estate prices in London lately? You would need some sort of drug

to handle that!

[RainDog]

2. Or illegal-level profit margins... n/t

[Fumesucker]

3. Without a legitimate source of legal supply organized crime will still dominate the trade

Decriminalization will do nothing to stop organized crime.

Bear in mind that alcohol was "decriminalized" during Prohibition in that personal possession and consumption of alcohol was not illegal, only the manufacture, sale or importation of it.

And yet we still got Al Capone.

[RainDog]

4. This also talks about decriminalizing cultivation

people come to their senses by degrees, sometimes.

one big hurdle is to overcome all the propaganda about reefer madness that continues to exist in bureaucratic form.