if there has been an increase in use in his opinion, why does even the Brown government acknowledge that cannabis use has dropped in the UK since reclassification?

Why do journalists parrot the pronouncements of the police drugs unit leader of a given jurisdiction without checking facts, as in this case?

Would it be too journalistically incorrect to point out such a man was/is lying? Perhaps to keep his job?

a person may hear voices and experience strange thoughts and paranoid delusions.

No thats what happens when you have a Labour government.

This story is utter rubbish and yet another example of the Oxford Mails non-news mewspaper.
e.g

If you have an underlying mental health illness, then smoking cannabis will bring it out.

Yeah and so can alcohol, over the counter medication, prescription medication etc etc.

we are quite happy on our boat leave us to be !!!

i agree, the fear surrounding cannabis is frightening. it's become a scapegoat, an easy explanation for the powers that be analysing the problems of poor, uninspired young men. for a start, how can the police claim use of cannabis has soared. what arrogance to think they have a handle on the numbers of people who use the drug. more than half my friends enjoy weed, and none have ever been in contact with the police. do these coppers honestly think most people who smoke weed care what latest grading the greyhairs have given the drug. the comments in this story are meaningless pap, the stuff betweeen walls. vague and unhelpful. do we need officials to tell people not to take drugs when they are mentally unstable. 40 more cautions, oh my god!!!

It's the time of year again where the wealthy and those who's job it is to spend the tax money have awarded themselves a rise in their salary and awarded the poor with redundancy.

The Redundant make their way to the job centre or into the employment market generally to find it awash with the governments imported cronies.

Aint it swell,cannabis makes you mad.

my god. do people actually still think like this man, that cannabis is harmful. Its idiots like this that are stopping this country moving forward, a sad man selling his lies to keep his job.

People have smoked cannabis for over 10,000 years and not one person has died, tobacco and alcohol kill 160,000 EVERY YEAR!

The fake, godly, 'drugs war' has failed, now lets take the money and jobs away from the criminals by legalising drugs and taking their business away from them.

Its the quickest, easiest and safest way of tackling the crime and safety issues concerning drug use.

If you support the prohibition of cannabis, your supporting the drug dealers.

Lets do the right thing as they've done in Holland and move cannabis away from drug dealers that sell hard drugs, legalise it, and sell it in coffee shops. It works, they've proven this year after year.
They have less drug addicts, less people in jail, less people smoking cannabis and less violent crime. And most importantly, no scary story's from the police, politicians or the media about how we're on the 'brink of total psychotic breakdown' because people are smoking a spliff instead of 10 pints of beer!

And lets not forget, Holland has openly sold in coffee shops across the country, the most strongest forms of cannabis available, to be smoked by anyone over the age of 18 and last year in a study by the UN children's organisation Unicef, came top of a league table for child well-being across 21 industrialised countries.

I think Pc Leigh Thompson, the county's drugs coordinator should start looking for another job.

Pc Leigh Thompson looks like he could do with inhaling some reefer man, he looks frightenly serious like one of those Spanish Inquisitors from the Dark Ages. I am turning mental looking at him.

Talk to Frank,plenty of anecdotal evidence there methinks.

I really don't know why the polce force bother to impliment the US reefer madness policies of the Jim Crow era.

Black men with big willies may marry your daughter wether you like it or not.

Alan page appears to be ill or absent, so I feel duty bound to point out in his absence that a single puff on a spliff absolutely guarantees the user with become a Daily Mail reading Little Englander Racist Bourgeois Paedophile.

Worse still, their brain will be so scrambled, they will lose the power to distinguish between different branches of sufism.

Remember kids- only users lose drugs- stay in school!

But it could be worse,in France children are required to have an imaginary freind,a dead Ashkenazi Jewish one.

Now if that isn't madness as policy then they will be needing a whole lot more funny farms for those who really cannot oblige the lunatics.

Reported today. Cannabis usage is decreasing. However Heroin and Crack are currently the nations top drug of choice.

We come top of the league in the world speedballing championships. Aren't you proud?

More people die from alcohol than those so they must be safer.

If you want to become a dribbling vegetable keep right on toking.

Those who have better things to with our brains will continue to laugh at your stupidity.

13 million downloads of child **** in the past 3 years in this country. Industrial levels of child abuse funding a criminal market. Online networking appears to render enforce selective and **** near impossible.

According to Kinsey, the paedophile question is also blighted by media coverage fuellling "reefer madness type hysteria".

So if prohibition doesn't work, junkies, what do you suggest we do?

I say keep nailing these right wing druggies with everything in our power. I also hold the same for Child pornography.

At least I am consistent.

DanOxford wrote:
Alan page appears to be ill or absent, so I feel duty bound to point out in his absence that a single puff on a spliff absolutely guarantees the user with become a Daily Mail reading Little Englander Racist Bourgeois Paedophile. Worse still, their brain will be so scrambled, they will lose the power to distinguish between different branches of sufism. Remember kids- only users lose drugs- stay in school!

Well as you yourself demonstrate the effects of taking shedloads, I think I will allow that comment to speak fpor itself.

But then Dan is up to anything that would be potentially profitable.

jane, a mother wrote:
my god. do people actually still think like this man, that cannabis is harmful. Its idiots like this that are stopping this country moving forward, a sad man selling his lies to keep his job. People have smoked cannabis for over 10,000 years and not one person has died, tobacco and alcohol kill 160,000 EVERY YEAR! The fake, godly, \'drugs war\' has failed, now lets take the money and jobs away from the criminals by legalising drugs and taking their business away from them. Its the quickest, easiest and safest way of tackling the crime and safety issues concerning drug use. If you support the prohibition of cannabis, your supporting the drug dealers. Lets do the right thing as they\'ve done in Holland and move cannabis away from drug dealers that sell hard drugs, legalise it, and sell it in coffee shops. It works, they\'ve proven this year after year. They have less drug addicts, less people in jail, less people smoking cannabis and less violent crime. And most importantly, no scary story\'s from the police, politicians or the media about how we\'re on the \'brink of total psychotic breakdown\' because people are smoking a spliff instead of 10 pints of beer! And lets not forget, Holland has openly sold in coffee shops across the country, the most strongest forms of cannabis available, to be smoked by anyone over the age of 18 and last year in a study by the UN children\'s organisation Unicef, came top of a league table for child well-being across 21 industrialised countries. I think Pc Leigh Thompson, the county\'s drugs coordinator should start looking for another job.

Is this the same Holland that has recently closed down quite a few of these establishments owing to an increase of kids with mental health problems?

The age of Kids in care of the mental health units growing progressivley younger, owing to the local home grown being about 10 times stronger than the illegal stuff ever was.

It hasn't killed off the criminal market.It has entrenched it. The same has happened in Czechoslavakia where a similar liberal policy was forced through (contrary to Vaclav Havel's own wishes).

By the way I hope the Ox mail will pass on the email addresses of all the contributors to this thread to the police.
They won't but they should.

"Do people think like this , man?" sums it up really.

Just out of interested I googled "Holland Children Cannabis" and found at the top a story from the Independent saying that children as young as 12 were going mad on this stuff.

Check it out Junkies!!

There are positive signs though.

Apparently there's a generation now who think the whole issue of drugs boring and dated.

Good!!

I have a family member that claims its harmless, thats why he has no job and no brain anymore. It destroys peoples' motivation. He survives with odd jobs.Its very stressful for his mother who worries he'll never have a normal life,as in a family life, he'll never be able to support one.His money goes to supporting his habit.

re rose. people detroy people's motivation. get him or her to stop smoking weed for three months and see if it makes a blind bit of difference. don't blame the drug for yr family member's weakness.

What qualification does a police officer have for making statements about medical matters?

Doctors don't tell the police how to tackle burglaries and muggings, perhaps they should.

It's thursday, you got no job, you aint got s*** to do, might as well get high!!!!

poor old alan..still wanting to believe what the papers say about 'the evil' cannabis..lol
Standing on his soap box trying to convince the world of the dangers of cannabis smoking when its very clear to everyone with one working brain sell that if you walk the streets on a friday, saturday,sunday, monday or any other night of the week that booze is the drug thats destroying the lives of the young and old, booze is killing thousands and thousands every week,fueling the violence and mental conditions of the masses.

A topic that never seems to be raised in the media about alcohol is the fact that it raises your chance of psychosis by 800% for men and 400% by females!

Im so glade that the number of people that do think like Pc Leigh Thompson and alan are dwindling...

from the Telegraph:
Ziggy MacDonald wanted cannabis legalised

Last Updated: 2:39am GMT 05/03/2008

The man leading the review of the drinking laws has called for the legalisation of cannabis.

Mr MacDonald joined the Home Office after working in the economics department of Leicester University, where he was regarded as an expert on crime and drugs policy.

In 2000, he entered the debate on a zero tolerance approach to cannabis. "I am in favour of completely legalising cannabis. I think it should be sold on Government licence and taxed,"

The most influential health, crime, drug and alcohol government advisers are all calling for cannabis to be legalised....

and about time too. its the safest drug in the world to take.

This really annoys me. Why do we focus on Cannabis, when Cigarettes and alcohol cause more problems, cost the government more money than cannabis. But they are nice taxable drugs. And why note focus on the Class A more. Heroin and Crack are the downfall to oxford. Everywhere i look there is someone of there face. makes me sick.

puff puff give, your f***ing up the rotation man!

All drugs can bring out underlying mental health problems. I work in a hospital and see people physically and mentally effected by the use of alcohol on a nearly daily basis. However, most of us would agree that in moderation alcohol is fairly safe. I feel the same is true for cannabis. Having a joint as a treat has not yet caused me any problmems.

As for all these arguments that the cannabis todaycan be stronger than epople expect - If cannabis were legalised the strength could be regulated, people would know exactly what they were getting.

Also if cannabisd were legalised people could buy it from proper outlets as opposed to having to search out drug dealers, thus increasing the risk they may move on to so called "hard drugs". And I'm sure the tax the governemnt could impose should sway them.

Tom wrote:
re rose. people detroy people's motivation. get him or her to stop smoking weed for three months and see if it makes a blind bit of difference. don't blame the drug for yr family member's weakness.

That is ****. My brother was turned into a vegetable by this crap.
Your in denial!!

Fairy wrote:
All drugs can bring out underlying mental health problems. I work in a hospital and see people physically and mentally effected by the use of alcohol on a nearly daily basis. However, most of us would agree that in moderation alcohol is fairly safe. I feel the same is true for cannabis. Having a joint as a treat has not yet caused me any problmems. As for all these arguments that the cannabis todaycan be stronger than epople expect - If cannabis were legalised the strength could be regulated, people would know exactly what they were getting. Also if cannabisd were legalised people could buy it from proper outlets as opposed to having to search out drug dealers, thus increasing the risk they may move on to so called \"hard drugs\". And I\'m sure the tax the governemnt could impose should sway them.

That is not the case in Holland.

The general strength of the legal stuff is 20 times stronger than the illegal stuff.

People who choose to engage in illegal activity cannot complain about the kind of company they keep.

This is of course merely the thin end of a corporate right wing drive to drag us all back 200 years where a highly lucrative drugs market was up and running.

It is money that is the centre of this militant junkie front NOT social justice.

jane wrote:
poor old alan..still wanting to believe what the papers say about 'the evil' cannabis..lol Standing on his soap box trying to convince the world of the dangers of cannabis smoking when its very clear to everyone with one working brain sell that if you walk the streets on a friday, saturday,sunday, monday or any other night of the week that booze is the drug thats destroying the lives of the young and old, booze is killing thousands and thousands every week,fueling the violence and mental conditions of the masses. A topic that never seems to be raised in the media about alcohol is the fact that it raises your chance of psychosis by 800% for men and 400% by females! Im so glade that the number of people that do think like Pc Leigh Thompson and alan are dwindling... from the Telegraph: Ziggy MacDonald wanted cannabis legalised Last Updated: 2:39am GMT 05/03/2008 The man leading the review of the drinking laws has called for the legalisation of cannabis. Mr MacDonald joined the Home Office after working in the economics department of Leicester University, where he was regarded as an expert on crime and drugs policy. In 2000, he entered the debate on a zero tolerance approach to cannabis. "I am in favour of completely legalising cannabis. I think it should be sold on Government licence and taxed," The most influential health, crime, drug and alcohol government advisers are all calling for cannabis to be legalised.... and about time too. its the safest drug in the world to take.

Yes, I do tend to believe the media hysteria concerning junkies. I also tend to believe the media hysteria surrounding paedos.
After all if the media is capable of distorting the plight of one group then it is capable of distorting the plights of others.

You claim that the media coverage of drug abusers is biased and inaccurate, what about child abusers?

If a police chief was to step up and advocate the legalisation of PROFFESSIONALLY AND VOLUNTARILY POSED pictures of naked six year olds so as to seperate this "harmless" material from the harder, more abusive, stuff would you support him?

Just keep toking away and spouting crap about comparative rizla papers, loser.

As for paranoid delusions. Perhaps the morbid fear that Dan and his boys have of Moslems could be put down to their drugs habits.
I don't touch the crap and have no issues. Strange that those that do have issues are also druggies and right wing.

re alan. you miss my point. i am not saying the drug isn't damaging to some people who use it a lot. i am saying you are weak if when something starts to break u, u are unable to quit it. i played football everyday until i had a serious injury. i can't play now. only an idiot would continue to hobble around the football pitch. if a drug is no longer working for you, then you should stop taking it. and that takes character and strength. banning the drug or legalising it is irrelevant.

Obviously you are refusing to understand my point, which is that being a completely clueless dimwit I have already forfeited all right to hold any opinion at all.
You would be a fool to waste a second of your time reading my repetitive posts!

eh?

Tom wrote:
re alan. you miss my point. i am not saying the drug isn\'t damaging to some people who use it a lot. i am saying you are weak if when something starts to break u, u are unable to quit it. i played football everyday until i had a serious injury. i can\'t play now. only an idiot would continue to hobble around the football pitch. if a drug is no longer working for you, then you should stop taking it. and that takes character and strength. banning the drug or legalising it is irrelevant.

Previous post not by me.
The problem is that I have also heard people say that Crack only gets you if your weak.

You cannot have it both ways. For people who have convinced themselves that it is safer than tobacco smoking 20 joints a day is a habit. I would agree that it is difficult to break a habit. Better not to start in the first place.

Tobacco only affects a person physically, it does not affect them mentally.

Psychoactive drugs target the brain, that is their function.

Can you not see the difference between mental and physical illness? And how people are being forcefed a diet of lies downplaying its effects?

What would be more useful would be to discover why people need to play with their brains.

In my brother's case it was low self esteem and a feeling of worthlessness. He has now found people who like what he does with paving slabs and they are giving him private work. His habit has gone down from 10 or 15 a day to two and he is much brighter for it. Even he feels the difference, if only in his wallet.

Estate Kids should have better things to aim for than getting smacked out of their brains.

The bourgeois have been partying on down on this **** for centuries. They have the income to be
able to talk glibly about how soft it is. Council estate kids don't. It's a symptom of despair and self loathing.

I think i prefered it when the police acted within the law and did not breach the terms of their contracts with gross political activism.

They need to turn off the BBC and realise that the British do not want or need the police state the BBC agitates and indoctrinates for.

''Tobacco only affects a person physically, it does not affect them mentally. ''

now your really starting to show how ignorant and uneducated about drugs you really are.

alan..do some research and then come and have a proper talk about drugs.

tobacco doesn't effect the brain...LOL

And too be honest, your brother was always going to be a mental case loser whether he took drugs or not. you should just be happy that cannabis gave you the warning signs before it manifested it self into a irreparable condition, much like your own.

I've been smoking cannabis every day for the last 20 years, and not the crappy plastic solid your brother smokes, but proper grass/chronic, i've worked for the BBC, ITV, channel4, Microsoft, The Welsh Assembly and the British Medical Board. I've won awards for design and television programs i've worked on....and all that time smoking joint after joint in the evening after work!

Cannabis has help me with my creative abilities and has helped me medically. Smoking pure herbal cannabis spliff's has stopped me from taking hard drugs, drink and tobacco, the biggest killers in the world.

For you to continue your uneducated guess work about cannabis is ridicules. nobody has ever died using cannabis, its non-toxic, that is to say it has no toxic chemicals what so ever, you can't die from using it alan.

and now your going to say 'yeah but it made my brother mental'

NO IT DIDN'T, your brother was already mental, cannabis doesn't CAUSE people to go mental or get psychosis they already have the illness.

and now your going to say 'yeah but cannabis leads to hard drugs'

NO IT DOESN'T, if this was true their would be millions upon millions of hard drug addicts in the uk, their are about 200,000 heroin users in the uk but a third of the population of the uk have smoked cannabis.
The fact is, cannabis use stops people using hard drugs. this is proved in Holland, oh and by the way all your information about Holland is horribly inacreate, they have much less drug users than the UK.

the Trimbos (Netherlands Institute of Mental Health and Addiction) surveys 10,000 Dutch schoolchildren every four years. The last study showed a small decline in cannabis use - 20 per cent of those aged 15-16 had tried it, and 5 per cent smoked it regularly. Less than one in 1,000 had tried heroin. The same year the European Drug Monitoring Center found 40 per cent of British children the same age had tried cannabis, and one in 50 had used heroin.

and they've sold the strongest cannabis in shops all over Holland for the past 40 years!

Every single argument you give about the evils of cannabis have been proved wrong by the very 'FACT' that Holland has a much better society than ours! they have less crime, less people in prison, fewer drug users, their kids are getting better grades in school and they have a better standard of living and the people are happier.

and to put the cream on the cake for the prohibitionist's. Last year in a study by the UN children's organisation Unicef, Holland came top of a league table for child well-being across 21 industrialised countries. and this is a country that has openly sold the strongest forms of cannabis in shops on the high streets in city centers across the country!

And just think how the police could concentrate on more serious criminals like your pedophile friends alan if they didn't have to wast so much money and time confiscating a harmless herb.

get a life loser! im so not surprised your brother had head problems if you his brother...god can you Imagen what it was like for the poor guy growing up with you as a brother...LOL

go on alan...drugs are bad'mmmm'kay...my brother...hard drugs....hang them all

have you never wondered what it like out side your bedroom?..

jane wrote:
''Tobacco only affects a person physically, it does not affect them mentally. '' now your really starting to show how ignorant and uneducated about drugs you really are. alan..do some research and then come and have a proper talk about drugs. tobacco doesn't effect the brain...LOL And too be honest, your brother was always going to be a mental case loser whether he took drugs or not. you should just be happy that cannabis gave you the warning signs before it manifested it self into a irreparable condition, much like your own. I've been smoking cannabis every day for the last 20 years, and not the crappy plastic solid your brother smokes, but proper grass/chronic, i've worked for the BBC, ITV, channel4, Microsoft, The Welsh Assembly and the British Medical Board. I've won awards for design and television programs i've worked on....and all that time smoking joint after joint in the evening after work! Cannabis has help me with my creative abilities and has helped me medically. Smoking pure herbal cannabis spliff's has stopped me from taking hard drugs, drink and tobacco, the biggest killers in the world. For you to continue your uneducated guess work about cannabis is ridicules. nobody has ever died using cannabis, its non-toxic, that is to say it has no toxic chemicals what so ever, you can't die from using it alan. and now your going to say 'yeah but it made my brother mental' NO IT DIDN'T, your brother was already mental, cannabis doesn't CAUSE people to go mental or get psychosis they already have the illness. and now your going to say 'yeah but cannabis leads to hard drugs' NO IT DOESN'T, if this was true their would be millions upon millions of hard drug addicts in the uk, their are about 200,000 heroin users in the uk but a third of the population of the uk have smoked cannabis. The fact is, cannabis use stops people using hard drugs. this is proved in Holland, oh and by the way all your information about Holland is horribly inacreate, they have much less drug users than the UK. the Trimbos (Netherlands Institute of Mental Health and Addiction) surveys 10,000 Dutch schoolchildren every four years. The last study showed a small decline in cannabis use - 20 per cent of those aged 15-16 had tried it, and 5 per cent smoked it regularly. Less than one in 1,000 had tried heroin. The same year the European Drug Monitoring Center found 40 per cent of British children the same age had tried cannabis, and one in 50 had used heroin. and they've sold the strongest cannabis in shops all over Holland for the past 40 years! Every single argument you give about the evils of cannabis have been proved wrong by the very 'FACT' that Holland has a much better society than ours! they have less crime, less people in prison, fewer drug users, their kids are getting better grades in school and they have a better standard of living and the people are happier. and to put the cream on the cake for the prohibitionist's. Last year in a study by the UN children's organisation Unicef, Holland came top of a league table for child well-being across 21 industrialised countries. and this is a country that has openly sold the strongest forms of cannabis in shops on the high streets in city centers across the country! And just think how the police could concentrate on more serious criminals like your pedophile friends alan if they didn't have to wast so much money and time confiscating a harmless herb. get a life loser! im so not surprised your brother had head problems if you his brother...god can you Imagen what it was like for the poor guy growing up with you as a brother...LOL go on alan...drugs are bad'mmmm'kay...my brother...hard drugs....hang them all have you never wondered what it like out side your bedroom?..

"Imagen"? Who's she?

Drugs have certainly improved your way of life havent they?

I am really sorry that my free speech appears to have upset my little degenerate junkie friend like this.

Not a clue as to how empty and pointless this post makes her look.

She is incapable of rational argument and so hurling chavvy abuse at me suits as well.

"I've blown skunk out of my arse every day for 20 years and I'm as tolerant,warm hearted,witty, articulate, kind as I ever was." LOL LOL!!

I would take up your kind offer to learn more about junkie culture but I really do have more important things to look into, Bruckner Symphonies, Kandinsky paintings, the differences between numerous philosophers etc.you know the kind of thing.

The stuff that keeps my mind occupied and gives me the kind of permanent lift that the company of degenerate racist sleazebals like you and the crap you talk 24/7 does.

So you see, you can yell, abuse, jump up and down about how persecuted you are, my poor dribbling little vegetable friend, but those of us with a wider perspective life ie those who haven't allowed a single issue to obssess us to the point of insanity will continue to show you up for the sad little intellectual cul de sac dwelling loser you really are.

You say you are a parent. My, what a fine upstanding mother figure you are giving them, eh?

I think they should be taken into care myself. I don't think growing about in atmosphere of skunk, cocaine, pills and all the rest of that crap is particularly healthy for them.

But then no doubt you need somebody to roll them up for you whilst you sit back on your fat degenerate druggie arse.

Come on Jane, how about another rant now? You can do it old girl.

Isn't it hilarious that cannabis is said to be a drug of peace and tranquility when it's users seem to be all as uptight and abusive as this bourgeois?

I think she is giving exactly the kind of pro drugs message this country needs. LOL LOL!!!

But Im a winer!! I am!!

I'm a real bona fide Winger!!

Your a looser, your family are losers!!

I'm a winer!! I love my drugs and I love my kids, I'm a winer!!

Imagen that!!

But then I notice it helps her with her creative work?

The underground Cartoonist Jay Lynch who used it in th sixties said that he found drugs inhibited his creative energy and all he could draw was flowery stuff that he's now ashamed of. "Now I am vehemently anti drugs."

Most drug induced art tends to fall into in the self indulgent catagory.

I don't need drugs, I am naturally creative. I pity those who do!!

This is so disheartening. I am just beside myself. I don't know what to do. I am ABNORMAL. I have consumed cannabis for 40yrs. I haven't heard voices. Well, I have, but there was always somebody there. I haven't even thought about killing myself. I must be abnormal. How sad. Should I turn myself in to the local nut house? Amazing I have been CRAZY all these years, and never knew it. I must be part of this mental health epidemic they're talking about. I am confused though. People have been consuming cannabis for over 5,000yrs and we're just now going to have a mental health epidemic. We haven't had it yet, but don't worry it's coming. Someday, it'll get here, they're sure. These people that consider cannabis a dangerous drug are a bunch of. You know what they say about, "if you can't say anything nice".

to those hoping this website will send our emails to the police: good luck w/ that sir. Have fun with arresting people most likely across international borders for something that is most likely legal in their country. I hope you call the cops on some kids smoking weed in a park and youre house gets robbed and burned to the ground because the police were busy attending to matters that you felt so highly incriminating (however completely harmless)you couldn't just be mildly respectable and have a word with them, maybe use logic and reasoning to convince them to change the habits - instead of throwing them in a police basement from which will most likely make them want to chief more. Moreover, everyone knows that drugs **** kids up, that's why you wait a couple years before consuming mass amounts of drugs that could blatently have a potentially harmful effect on a developing brain. But hey, mine's still at that stage too and after a few years of the haziest and cloudiest years of my life I can still teach you sober people a few lessons. Heh, and look how that worked out for you, spending your days trolling forums on sites you have no interest in... yea sure wish I never picked up an L. If you want my advice take a few hits and laugh a little, oh and you might wanna find a new blog to troll.