h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Mmmm. Works for Holland, no?

B

I don't exactly know what the policy is for foreign trade of canabis. But I think as it is illegal in most of Europe, the Schengen treaty dictates a ban on foreign trade. This leaves the question of the inner boudaries of the EU. As far as I know the borders with Belgium or Germany aren't checked at all, so...

The Netherlands do get a lot of heat from certain countries because of its drugs policy. They argue that it is a mayor exporter of drugs, especially XTC. It is often conveniently forgotten that XTC is illegal here too.

What everybody has failed to mention is the cross section of society that actually enjoy a Sunday joint or two. I for one do not feel the need to roll a joint for breakfast, lunch and tea every day. I do not drink alcohol as I feel totally out of control and do not like feeling sick as a dog. I have one, sometimes two, cups of tea a day. Not a fan of coffee. I have been free of the evil tobacco now for a year and three days (after 12 years of dependency.)

Sometimes though I feel like letting go. I have worked very hard all week and I want to relax. For some that means going to the pub and getting legless. Others go to the gym and work out. I want to sit on my sofa and smoke a joint, giggle at the shopping channel and eat a whole bar of Cadburys. But that is illegal (just the joint bit - not the sofa, shopping channel or the Cadburys).

If we could see who it was that, like me, enjoy a little toke now and then, I think it would shock those anti-cannabis campaigners to the core. Their parents might use it. The local vicar. The nice couple they met in church last week. The middle age professional couple they see going to work every morning in their respective mid-range cars.

I have never been near a "dealer" in my life. I have always obtained what I needed from friends. I don't want to get involved in the seedy side of things and wish I could just go to a shop like you would go to a tobacconist or off license and buy a draw or two.

One day soon I hope...

>I have never been near a "dealer" in my life. I have always obtained what I needed from friends.<

I really, really don't mean to be rude, but doesn't that make your friend a dealer? It certainly does in the eyes of the law.

I think you know what I meant by a "dealer" BS. The friends I get it from don't make a profit or "deal" any other higher class drugs. What they do further back on the chain is not my business. I just wish it were different.

Turning a blind eye to where it comes from 'further down the chain' is lovely if you can do it.
The reason the courts make no distinction between so-called 'social supply' and supply for profit is that somewhere back down the line there is a very rich criminal, who isn't just supplying the odd bit of draw to his mates, but is involved in a serious, money making operation that they will do a great deal to protect, including violence. You'll probably find that they sell cocaine, crack, heroin and ecstasy as well.

If cannabis is 'legalized' (and even Blunkett's new regulations only make it a class C drug-ie legal to possess but NOT legal to supply) then fine. But at the moment it remains an offence to supply it.

The Dutch analogy isn't quite on a par, Ben. As I understand, the coffee shops can only hold 2 oz at a time, which if nothing else provides a lucrative source of income for scooter delivery boys. Mycroft's point is a good one, and the Dutch government do come under extreme pressure from the rest of Europe on occasions. A potential de-criminalization of all drugs could have disasterous effects on those countries inside the European Market with whom we have 'open' borders.

They probably make a little bit of free grass for themselves at least,thas just the way it works and one of the reasons it's quite easy to get drawn into being a dealer.You start off sorting out a few friends and then before you know it they are getting it from you for their friends and before long your on the plane back to England with five holdalls stuffed with white widow.It happens.

I thought there was a pretty serious amount of home-growing going on in the UK at the moment. There certainly seem to be plenty of companies advertising seeds and growing lights, and I read somewhere that the import market for herbal cannabis had rather fallen off of late.

The more that happens, and the flatter the supply pyramid becomes, the less likelihood that there will be a rich dealer somewhere up the line, (or possibly any dealer as such at all) and the less weight will one of the main arguments against cannabis consumption carry - the supposed financing of other kinds of crimes (on the assumption that bank robberies and other kinds of smuggling were so inefficiently run that they needed drugs profits to cross-subsidise them.)

Home growing is fine, but as any pot-head will tell you home grown in the UK has about half the THC (the 'active' ingredient of cannabis) of stuff grown naturally, abroad.

It's never likely to reoplace imported cannabis as the main source.

Potholer, there was a report on the BBC news web site a couple of weeks ago regarding the quantity and quality of domestically cultivated skunk now being produced in the UK and how this had lead to a significant fall in the amount of herbal cannabis being imported.

However, due to the sheer quantities being grown it has not removed the criminal making a fat profit. We are talking commercial scale horticulture here, requiring a fairly substantial capital investment (site, lights, irrigation system, dryers etc.), having said that the street price for skunk and other types of herbal cannabis has certainly dropped over the last couple of years.

I don't think it's a question of robberies and other tyrpe of crime being so innefficient they need subsidising.

Rather drugs offer quick and easy proits for a minmum of risk for the big supplier, who isn't ussually the one on the streets running the risk of getting nicked.

And of course, the IRA are only in Colombia to help with training tactics, not to help subsidise their own operations with smuggling Colombian marching powder at all. That's how organized crime fits into drugs. Into doesn't subsidize armed robbers, but street gangs and terrorists.

It's all very well you taking the moral high ground because you are in the CPS, Blues Shark? Would your views differ if you were, say for instance, a pizza delivery person? Your knowledge doesn't mean that you are always correct. Have you ever done something that you knew was illegal but thought it was a stupid illegality? Parked briefly on a double yellow when there was nowhere else to park for miles around? Broken the speed limit on a road that is marked 40 but should obviously be 70? Bought back more than your allowance in Duty Free's?

It is not a personal slur - just an observation seeing as you seem to be the one doing the most debating against the legalisation of cannabis. All I want is to not be breaking the law when I want to enjoy something that I see as less harmful than "legal" drugs like cigarettes and alcohol.

Actually, the answer to the first question, ie have I ever broken the law because i thought it was daft is yes.
If you read the thread you'll note I've said twice that I *don't* care about the legalisation of cannabis, provided that people are *properly* educated about the health issues involved.

I also happen to believe that people should be properly informed about how and why cannabis comes to be smuggled in such huge quantities. I make no distinction between people being educated about the health issues of cannabis and being educated about the social effects of large scale drugs operations.

Ross, the point about price of equipment is well made. Any operation to produce 'homegrown' cannabis has to be on a commercial basis just to pay for the equipment in the first place.
I'm not sure what the source of your figures is, but I know that prices of weed/skunk etc here in the south east have been stable for the last ten years. There's certainly been no drop in price.

Hear hear lady in a tree!

I often fall in the same trap as blues shark. I know alot about drugs (i'm a pharmacologist) but that dosn't make me right all the time.

I'll say this, I enjoy a toke every now and again, otherwise i never break the law. I'm simply fed up of being a criminal because just because I dont want to get legless and smash the city centre up. I do care that I'm suporting organised crime for my toke but it is just like american drinking dens during the prohibition, the dealers are providing a service.

I simply want them to provide a legal service, cut out the crime boss, and to the bargin make the government some money nowt wrong with that!

>I simply want them to provide a legal service, cut out the crime boss, and to the bargin make the government some money nowt wrong with that!<

Broadly speaking, I'd agree (except for my caveats about educating users). The difficulty with Blunkett's half way house is that it actually *increases* the potential profits for criminals, because the potential number of customers is now much greater.

Well BS my evidence is purely anecdotal - from my own purchasing and that of friends - but "home grown" (commercially/criminally grown here in the UK)skunk has most certainly dropped in price over the last few years both in hard cash as well as real (i.e. adjusted for inflation terms).

Well the less than anecdotal evidence I have is that it
1) no dealer ever offered to sell cheap drugs because they weren't good quality. It's always been a market where the word is 'Caveat Emptor.'
2) that the price of drugs hasn't dropped in ten years.

Your suppliers must be very generous, very foolish, or both.

There are harmful effects of cannabis....erm, but I can't remember what they are. Anybody eating that biscuit?

BS - it seems to me to ba classic case of supply and demand - too much supply leads to a drop in price to stimulate deamnd to absorb the over supply etc. etc. Classic Keynesian economics.

I'd agree in principle, but the greater success by Police and Customs in cutting out foreign supplies has meant that supply has actually shrunk (if only slightly), certainly in my part of the world.