George Ruston, Chief Executive of Hope UK (a Forum member), writes in Christian Today on why his organisation thinks that cannabis should be reclassified:
Hope UK educators continually meet young people who equated the downgrading of the drug with a view that it was safe to use. Over time, this view does appear to have been partly eroded by the continuing publicity about the adverse effects of cannabis.
It is essential that a clear and consistent message about cannabis is given and its legal status plays a critical part in this. However, whatever the law says is only part of the story and there needs to be greater priority given to education and prevention, equipping those young people who do not use cannabis with the information with which they can influence their friends. The harm related to cannabis will only really start to reduce once people’s hearts and minds are won over.
You can read their submission to the ACMD here.
Filed under: ACMD, Drug Education Forum Members, cannabis, classification , cannabis reclassification
Hope have advanced a well reasoned and balanced argument for re-classification, and one would like to think that the ACDM will view it favourably.
Unfortunately the damage has been done and is probably irreversible among the current generation of suffferers. Nevertheless if the government acts on Hope’s suggestions, and in the process gives as much adverse publicity to the dangers of cannabis as it has done to smoking, inroads can be made into the widely accepted view that cannabis is harmeless.