Cannabis

Lord Low of Dalston Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2017 Grand Committee

[Lord Low of Dalston (CB)]

My Lords, I echo the congratulations offered by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, to the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, on securing this debate and for all her tireless work to secure a more rational policy on the regulation of drugs, from founding the all-party group, whose reports we have been reading, to her work and representations at the United Nations and around the world. The noble Baroness, in encouraging me to speak this afternoon, said that it need only be a very short speech. With the time limits, I think we have no option but to make a very short speech.

I declare an interest: I am a member of the aforementioned all-party group, but I was not involved in the inquiry into the medicinal use of cannabis. Cannabis, as we have heard, is classified with dangerous drugs with no medicinal value, yet it is clear that it does have medicinal value. It was perceived to provide great relief by 86% of those responding to an online survey commissioned by the all-party group. More than 90% reported no or only mild side-effects, whereas—as we just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Howarth—respondents using prescription medicines can experience considerable side-effects. The evidence is nuanced as to the precise scope of the medicinal value, but the Barnes review undertaken for the all-party group concluded that there is good evidence for the efficacy of cannabis in the management of chronic pain and the side-effects of chemotherapy.

At the very least, therefore, cannabis-based treatment can provide significant benefit for a group of patients of at least 10,000—and, in some estimations, very many more—suffering from chronic pain where other treatments have failed. This would be reason enough to reclassify cannabis. Schedules 2 and 3 include drugs that may be illegal for recreational use but can be made available on prescription. If cannabis were to be placed in Schedule 2, it would be in the same class as heroin, which is no less addictive—indeed, it is considerably more so, as we know—and there is no evidence of significant diversion of heroin from medical supplies to the illicit recreational market. Moreover, as we again heard from the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, Sativex, which is a proprietary product derived from cannabis, is classified in Schedule 4. In these circumstances, retaining cannabis in Schedule 1 is illogical and perverse.

The overriding reason for moving cannabis to one of the other schedules—this is my main point, really—is that it follows a policy of regulation rather than prohibition. In the reading I did in preparation for this debate, I counted that this has at least six consequential advantages, but I have time to mention only a couple of them. First, since the use of cannabis would now be lawful, patients could take it under medical guidance and supervision. When that guidance and supervision is not available, when people are forced to acquire their cannabis outside the law, the product that they obtain off the street is often much more harmful. How much better to be using it when it provides its benefits under proper medical supervision.

Secondly, the current regime places a stranglehold on research. Carrying out research into cannabis in the UK has been described as a costly obstacle course. It involves a minimum outlay of £5,000 to cover licensing and security, and licence applications can take as long as a year. It has been calculated that research involving Schedule 1 drugs takes significantly longer and costs about 10 times as much as research into other drugs.

In view of all the considerations that have been spoken to in the debate, I hope very much that the Minister will agree that the matter should be referred to the advisory council. Referring the matter for the opinion of an independent expert body, which of course does not commit the Government, is not exactly selling the pass.