Cannabis: Medicinal Use

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 4th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

The evidence base for the quality and effectiveness of these products is limited; it is developing. This is why the Government have asked the MHRA to call for a proposal to enhance our knowledge of these medications. However, we have not waited for this; we have introduced a route via unlicensed medications which allows for doctors who are on the specialist register to prescribe for patients. This is the right route; these are the doctors who will understand the conditions mostly likely to benefit from prescription and who are able to make a judgment about the safety and efficacy of medicinal cannabis. It is the route usually used for unlicensed medications and already set up by the MHRA. We want to see more licensed products in this route, however; we call upon industry to invest in more trials and publish the results and full underpinning data to build our knowledge so that more patients are able to benefit.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

The majority of those guilty of violent terrorist crimes in this country are found to be heavy users of cannabis. When one looks at violent crime outside of terrorism, it seems again—although I do not know the details—that very often the people involved are heavy users of skunk—not the kind of cannabis that we are talking about but the liquid stuff. Are the Government looking at the relationship between the use of these really strong types of cannabis and violent crime, to see whether anything should be done about it?

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

The medicines we are speaking about are not skunk. The noble Lord is right that all medicines carry risk, but they can also be beneficial. That is why we have introduced a route to allow medicinal cannabis to be used for those conditions where it will be beneficial. The change in the law allows strict access by specialist doctors who, in making the decisions to prescribe, can ensure that the benefit outweighs the harm to the patient and that the restrictions are line with advice from the ACMD. Any further concerns around the kinds of drugs that the noble Lord is talking about are still strictly controlled by the Home Office and by policing.