It’s a danger to health... but so is alcohol
KAYLUM was impressive as he walked into the room. Well over 6ft, he was strongly built but had a quiet presence. He had been taking cannabis in Liverpool for seven years, starting as a teenager, but had recently developed psychosis and been sectioned in hospital.
Doctors believe cannabis is linked to his condition. Yet Kaylum finds comfort in smoking the drug and does not want to stop using it.
His story reminded me of a lecture I heard 15 years ago, when experts said those who take cannabis before the age of 16 are four times more likely to suffer severe mental illness. This informed my work as a police commissioner, taking a tough line on cannabis.
But more and more states in America are now legalising cannabis. Canada last week became the first major Western country to do so. I wanted to see the effects of legalisation first-hand, so I went to Colorado in the United States, where using cannabis was legalised in January 2014, to investigate for Channel 4 Dispatches.
My first observation was that legitimate competition has driven down the price of cannabis from $500 an ounce before legalisation to $100 today. The potency of the drug has also increased hugely: the content of THC – which gets users high – has risen from 14 per cent to more than 90 per cent in some products.
There are more ways of taking the drug, too. You can buy it as a patch, a balm or a bar of chocolate.
One company is making $400 million a year. The 5,000 inhabitants of Edgewater, a small town I visited, have gained $1 million in extra tax a year, enabling them to build a new police station and civic centre. They plan to give the police a pay rise.
There is a general acceptance in Colorado that reform has worked out, despite some issues. Even the mayor of Denver, a past opponent, believes it has been successful. But in a hospital emergency ward, a doctor told me the legalisation was the worst thing the state had done.
Doctors report seeing overdoses among those who have taken edible cannabis, presumably because the drug takes longer to have effect when eaten, so they take more. But supporters say this can be tackled through education – and, as many people told me, no one dies from cannabis. Another doctor at the University of Colorado Medical Centre told me he has seen a fourfold increase in patients with a psy- chiatric disorder attributable to cannabis, although absolute numbers remain small.
Usage has not changed. The higher potency appears to lead users to find their best doses. You may drink six bottles of beer in a night but not six bottles of whisky – and cannabis users are no more foolish than drinkers.
Denver’s police chief told me he could not see major problems due to cannabis legalisation. There is still a black market, however, which i ronically supplies Colorado’s young, who must be 21 before they can buy it legally. Cannabis is also smuggled to neighbouring states where it remains illegal.
If Britain were to consider legalisation, I would prefer the Canadian way. In America, each of the nine states that has legalised the drug has held a referendum, resulting in a licensing framework that differs from state to state.
Some states permit medical use, some recreational. Legal limits on age, cultivation and possession vary. Cannabis use remains illegal on a federal level, so universities cannot get funding to research long-term effects of reform.
In Canada, the legislation has been introduced nationwide only after MPs asked experts to examine all available evidence. Then politicians went to work on legislation focused on limiting harm to users and protecting children.
So what would I do if I was Home Secretary? Follow the evidence, as I did for 40 years in the police. Thankfully, we do not need to be pioneers and can learn from experiments elsewhere.
I would set up a body of experts to report within two years. They should be asked to look at the accumulating evidence on legalisation with open minds, and report their conclusions, including whether they feel the evidence suggests cannabis could be safely legalised.
We know prohibition of cannabis has resulted in criminal gangs using violence as they compete for trade and territory. But evidence shows that alcohol causes more violence every night of the week.
Besides, with medical cannabis arriving in Britain within the next few months, we can expect some to slide into the recreational market, as evidence has shown elsewhere.
It may be a poor argument to say we should l egalise something because it is as bad as other legal products. But equally it is hard to justify criminalising a substance less harmful than products we can buy in a shop and at some level has medical benefits.
Cannabis: Time To End The Ban? – Channel 4 Dispatches is on tomorrow at 8pm.