New clause 1 - Inclusion of khat as a Class A drug
Drugs Bill
4:45 pm

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Mr Roger Gale (North Thanet, Conservative)

With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 4—Classification of cannabis as Class B—

'(1) Schedule 2 to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971[2] (which specifies the drugs which are subject to control under that Act) shall be amended as follows.

(2) In paragraph (a) of Part I of that Schedule, insert at an appropriate place ''Cannabinol, except where contained in cannabis or cannabis resin'' and ''Cannabinol derivatives''.

(3) In paragraph (a) of Part II of that Schedule, insert at an appropriate place ''Cannabis and cannabis resin'' shall be deleted.

(4) In paragraph (a) of Part III of that Schedule, ''Cannabinol'', ''Cannabinol derivatives'' and ''Cannabis and cannabis resin'' shall be deleted.

(5) In paragraph 1(d) of Part III of that Schedule, ''cannabinol or a cannabinol derivative'' shall be deleted.'.{**we**}

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

New clause 1 has been referred to in anticipation of reaching it because it seeks to focus the Minister's mind on the classification of khat, which contains cathinone or cathine. Khat is a green-leaf shrub that has been chewed for a long time by people who live in the Horn of Africa on the Arabian peninsula, but unfortunately it has recently turned up in Europe, including in the UK. It has been particularly prevalent among immigrants and refugees from countries such as Somalia, Ethiopia and Yemen. Khat is imported and sold at greengrocers in areas such as east London in a very similar way to magic mushrooms. It sells at about £4 a bunch, but remains potent for only a few days after it is picked. It is strongest when the fresh leaves are chewed, but it can also be made into a tea or chewable paste.

The khat plant is not controlled under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, but its active ingredients, cathinone and cathine, are class C drugs—a condition that is similar to magic mushrooms. Cathinone may not lawfully be possessed or supplied except under licence for research, although cathine may be prescribed.

Khat is illegal in America, Canada, Norway and Sweden, and I understand that it was controlled in Tanzania, Kenya and Somalia. It is a stimulant drug with effects similar to those of amphetamines. Chewing it makes people talkative, suppresses their appetite, and can cause insomnia, anorexia and anxiety. It makes people irritable, angry and possibly violent, and if hon. Members have time to cruise the internet, like the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland, there are horrible stories about domestic violence being brought on by it. I am aware of the Government's measures to relieve domestic violence problems in this country. Psychological dependence can also result from regular use of the drug, and users become hooked and get very depressed and low if they do not use it.

Reports among the Yemeni population indicate that khat is consumed by three in four Yemenis. In Yemen, fairly accurate research shows that khat use accounts for more than 40 per cent. of the average family budget, which is an alarming statistic, especially as chronic khat abuse results in all the symptoms of   amphetamine addiction. It also results in hypertension and gastric disorders, which cost our national health service more and more. We also export it. There are real problems, because I understand that some 18 tonnesof it were seized on flights from the UK to the US in 1998, which is the last time for which I could find figures available.

I know from the Minister's earlier answer that the Government have no plans to control khat at the moment, but that the advisory council is keeping its legal status under review. I understood that the Home Office's drugs and alcohol research unit was to embark on a detailed study to assess the level of harm caused by khat. It was expected that the final report would be completed in September 2004, with the interim findings being available in April 2004. I hope the Minister will give us the progress of that, because I have not seen that report, and I am not aware whether the promise made in her answer of 8 September 2003 was actually kept. The reference is the answer to Question 127515 at column 60W. Apparently, this report was going to inform future decisions on whether khat would be controlled. It is absolutely correct that khat misuse is part of a wider diversity issue. I would have hoped, however, that, having made that promise, the Minister would come to this Committee and tell us exactly what the Government are going to do about it.

New clause 4 is familiar ground for the Minister, and I think we have been around the houses on this debate several times. I am sure that she is not going to agree with me, but it is the classification of cannabis. Back in October 2001, the previous Home Secretary, who has had to step down, announced the change to the classification of cannabis when he was giving evidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee. He had to go through the hoop that required him to consult the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, and he was going to look at the results of the so-called Lambeth experiment, which, if the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) is anything to go by, was nothing but a complete and utter disaster.

Despite the adverse results from the Lambeth experiment, cannabis was reclassified in January 2004. The message went out, up and down the country, that the Government believed that we should not tolerate cannabis. At best, it was tolerance of possession and dealing, and at worst it was that the taking of it was legal. There is no point in the Minister pretending otherwise. I have even had children say to my face that taking cannabis is legal. The confusion was, I suppose, accepted by the Minister, because she had to spend £1 million of taxpayers' money on a campaign to try to clarify the situation, solving the problem of public confusion on the legality of cannabis.

The cursory evaluation of the campaign said that a survey of a representative sample of 14 to 70 year olds showed that 81 per cent. agreed that smoking cannabis was harmful. Although those results were evaluated for a campaign on or around 17 May 2004, even if we just start to cruise the internet and pick up the odd article, we will find that—[Interruption.]  

Mr Roger Gale (North Thanet, Conservative)

Order. The Chairman is finding it rather difficult to hear the debate.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

The Observer—not necessarily a friend of those who think as I do about this drug—admitted:

''Not for the first time, the Police Federation is confused. As we report today, the union representing beat officers believes that the downgrading of cannabis from a Class B to a Class C drug has left its members unclear about what to do about the rise in the numbers of people openly smoking marijuana on the street. They say that declassification has led to a casual culture of lawlessness and that police officers are provoked by people smoking joints and believing they are above the law.''

Reclassification has led to confusion over the status of cannabis, and it is now in the same category as tranquilisers and steroids.

Another problem was that the drug was downgraded at a time when all the evidence seemed to be rolling in of there being more dangers. Professor Robin Murray, the professor of psychiatry at Maudsley hospital, showed that cannabis consumption exacerbates the symptoms of schizophrenia-like psychosis and can lead to panic attacks, paranoia and long-term mental illness. Smoking cannabis is worse than smoking a cigarette. The Minister is familiar with the arguments about additional costs and the extra damage caused by tetrahydrocannabinols. Cannabis is getting stronger. Whereas in the '60s and '70s I gather that the strength was about 10 mg in the average spliff, it is now about 150 mg.

The new clause gives the Minister the opportunity to admit that she was wrong and reclassify the drug to class B. That would send out the right message on this dangerous drug, and ensure that the damage that has occurred and the confused messages that she and the former Home Secretary have been responsible for will be repaired.

There was a letter today in The Daily Telegraph—I hope that the Minister reads The Daily Telegraph because it carries the odd useful article—from someone whose name and address was supplied, entitled, ''Cannabis is turning our youth into dopes.'' The letter stated:

''I agree entirely that 'cannabis is a 'ruiner' of young men'. I have witnessed this in my sons who, now in their mid-twenties, are just recovering from the loss of 'drive, motivation and concentration' as they ruefully and belatedly establish their careers, having almost missed out on successful higher education.

We parents, in our innocence, thought they were just being teenagers when they were paranoid, apparently unable to move faster than a slow shuffle and had a total lack of concern for their future. Oh, how Harry Enfield's Kevin helped us keep a sense of humour.

They, in turn, have witnessed friends slide into depression owing to excessive dope smoking. I have a friend whose daughter ended up in a mental hospital for dope-induced depression.

As for the dope-smoking parents . . . they are encouraging an illegal activity that ruins young people's lives. It is to be hoped that the children of such parents will do what so many teenagers do and reject their elders' lifestyle.''

That is a timely reminder of what can happen.

I would also like to pay tribute to Mrs. Mary Brett, who many hon. Members know is a teacher at Dr. Challoner's grammar school in my constituency. She has always been scrupulously fair in the information that she provides, and her fears for our   young people are based on many years of teaching experience. I hope that the Minister will seriously reconsider, and I am giving her that opportunity today.

Mr Alistair Carmichael (Shadow Minister (Northern Ireland), Northern Ireland Affairs; Orkney and Shetland, Liberal Democrat)

I should first apologise to the Committee for being unable to remain here beyond 5.15 pm—I will not hear the Minister's response and I will not be present at the conclusion of the Committee's business. Therefore, without incurring your wrath, Mr. Gale, I shall stray just for a second and express my gratitude to you and Mr. Illsley, other members of the Committee, officials and others who have made our deliberations so smooth and, for the most part, enjoyable if not always exciting.

The hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham was right to draw parallels between khat and magic mushrooms—my thinking is informed by the same parallels. My argument in relation to magic mushrooms is that the classification of drugs is due a review. For us in this Committee to classify khat in this way without proper consultation would not be particularly helpful. For that reason, I fear that there is an element in this of making policy on the hoof, so I am not minded to support the new clause.

I was struck by the description that the hon. Lady gave of the effects of khat—from my past life as a director of a women's refuge in Aberdeenshire, I recognised them as being not very different from those of alcohol. When we think about the classification of drugs, and the way in which we treat them, we have to look at them in the round, rather than considering just those that we currently regard as being controlled.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

The fundamental difference is that we know the problem that this drug causes and we have the opportunity to place it in the same category as that in which the Minister has placed magic mushrooms. Why lose the opportunity at this stage? It seems logical to me.

Mr Alistair Carmichael (Shadow Minister (Northern Ireland), Northern Ireland Affairs; Orkney and Shetland, Liberal Democrat)

It would not be wise for us simply to do that at the end of the Committee stage, without the proper consultation or the proper advice from the relevant Government bodies. We shall have to agree to differ on that point.

With regard to the new clause seeking the reclassification of cannabis as a class B drug, as I indicated earlier, I was not particularly impressed—although my party supported it—with the reclassification to class C. Reclassifying it along with things such as anabolic steroids and painkillers, and tranquilisers such as diazepam and temazepam was not helpful and I feared that it would cause confusion. I should bring to the Minister's attention the words of Sheriff Douglas Cusine, sitting in Aberdeen Sheriff court last Friday. He said—I am quoting from memory; I do not have it in front of me—that he found it difficult to see exactly what the Government sought to achieve with that reclassification. In his view it had led to significant confusion among people who were appearing before him in a very busy court. The sheriff is an eminently sensible, well qualified lawyer, who, in an earlier incarnation, had the misfortune to   try to teach me conveyancing when he was Professor Cusine. Otherwise, he is a man to whom the Government should be prepared to listen.

Given the danger of confusion, I would not be minded to support the hon. Lady's amendment. To reclassify a reclassified drug would merely heap confusion on top of confusion. I must stress again that, rather than mucking around with categories that are no longer fit for purpose, we should look at classification as a whole.

Mr Eric Joyce (PPS (Mr Mike O'Brien, Minister of State), Department of Trade and Industry; Falkirk West, Labour)

I listened with interest to what the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham had to say on new clause 4. On one level, much of it was simple common sense. She was right about the effect on users of khat and cannabis. However, that the purpose of a classification system is to make it clear that there are different grades. If we were to upgrade both those drugs back up to B, it would create additional confusion. There are three levels: we understand that class A drugs are very serious, B is a bit less and C is a bit less again. It would send out the wrong signals to change it the other way. The three grades work well.

It is also important to say that the drug of choice of most older adults, probably most of us here, is alcohol. The abuse of alcohol creates far more trouble in our high streets and our homes than does the use of khat or cannabis. If we think about the things that take up police time, alcohol abuse takes up far more police time and leads to far more offences than khat or cannabis. The latter tend to keep people relatively quiet. Very few people commit violent offences when they are taking khat or cannabis.

Mr Tom Harris (PPS (Rt Hon John Spellar, Minister of State), Northern Ireland Office; Glasgow Cathcart, Labour)

In the spirit of helpfulness, does my hon. Friend believe that we should classify alcohol as category B?

Mr Eric Joyce (PPS (Mr Mike O'Brien, Minister of State), Department of Trade and Industry; Falkirk West, Labour)

I would be very reluctant to classify alcohol as category B.

This debate goes on when we talk about how we should classify any type of drug. Ultimately, one of the most serious drugs is one that we tolerate enormously in society—everyone is this Room uses it, in moderation, of course—and it is alcohol.

The hon. Lady mentioned the Police Federation and its view that the policy would lead to confusion. My instinct would be that the Police Federation would welcome any policy that would enable them to direct the resources appropriately towards the use of alcohol, which leads to other offences. I suspect that the net effect of getting it right would be not just to reduce the abuse of alcohol and drugs, but to reduce the total number of offences in the high street, in our homes and in all our communities.

I cannot remember the figures off the top of my head, but I believe that there has been a substantial net gain in terms of thousand man and woman hours that police officers saved by directing efforts properly towards far more serious and important offences. That is not to say that we should be casual about any kind of drug abuse, but we want to direct the police to the more serious offences. I am thinking about the   kind of thing that I see when I walk about my constituency on a Friday or Saturday evening downtown. It is alcohol that causes most of those offences.

I am thinking not only about the abuse of alcohol but about the offences that lead on from it. A couple of months ago I was burgled by some guy who just happened to be walking past my house. He climbed in through the front window and thought that it would be a good idea to steal a few things from the living room and then to walk out of the front door. He was drunk, and I had left the front window off the latch. That is the kind of thing that people will do when they are high and excited. Alcohol does that. Young men are much more likely to get into fights and to commit violent offences when they are drunk late on a Saturday night or early on a Sunday morning.

I believe that the classification system that we have is right. I recognise that the abuse of any drug is a bad thing, but the particular drug that concerns me is the drug that causes violence on the high street and causes far more serious offences than people using khat and cannabis. New clause 4 is therefore a bad idea.

Mr Henry Bellingham (Shadow Minister, Economic Affairs; North West Norfolk, Conservative)

I support my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham. I do not want to detain the Committee for very long, so I will not refer to new clause 1, but I want to say a quick word about new clause 4 and the reclassification of cannabis. I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. She made it quite clear that the main concern is about what signal that sends to the wider community. In the Government's document ''Tackling drugs. Changing lives'', on page 9, under the heading ''Reducing availability: putting drug dealers out of business'', there is a big tick next to a paragraph that states that the Government have been:

''Focusing efforts against Class A drugs by reclassifying cannabis. Arrests for cannabis possession have fallen by 30 per cent. since reclassification, enabling police time to be released to deal with Class A drugs.''

It does not give any evidence that that has been achieved; it is simply a general statement. I would question—

Mr Michael Clapham (Barnsley West and Penistone, Labour)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr Henry Bellingham (Shadow Minister, Economic Affairs; North West Norfolk, Conservative)

I wish to make progress.

My hon. Friend referred to what has been going on in the constituency of the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey)—the so-called Lambeth experiment. I have spoken to police officers in Vauxhall and Lambeth who have made it absolutely clear that they are extremely unhappy about what has been going on, especially in Brixton, where there has been a proliferation of street dealers who are using the reclassification of cannabis as a Trojan horse to peddle more hard drugs. That is the main concern and it is a great pity that the Government have not looked very carefully at what has been going on in Lambeth and Brixton. Why have they not done a proper assessment and analysis of what has been going on? Why have they not listened to what the Police Federation has been saying?  

I find it interesting that the new Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, said the other day that he would bear down very hard on middle class cocaine parties. He made no mention at all of cannabis. The recent report by the Royal College of Physicians makes it clear that persistent and regular cannabis use can inflict substantial damage, including damage to the brain. Youngsters, at a time when their brains are developing, are particularly vulnerable to that.

Ms Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (reducing organised and international crime, anti drugs co-ordination and international and European issues), Home Office; Don Valley, Labour)

The hon. Gentleman is right that cannabis is harmful, but does he not accept that cocaine is a far more serious drug? The commissioner is quite right, and I am sure that the Royal College of Physicians would also say that cocaine has an even greater impact on the health of the individual. Does the hon. Gentleman agree with that?

Mr Henry Bellingham (Shadow Minister, Economic Affairs; North West Norfolk, Conservative)

I entirely agree, but that is not really the argument. The question is: should the Government have reclassified cannabis? Have they sent the right signal in doing so? Have resources been refocused and redeployed in a way that enables the police and the Government to bear down on hard drugs? I am not convinced about that, but I am convinced that the wrong signals are being sent.

I am convinced that a lot of youngsters are confused. I have spoken to a lot of teachers and youth groups in my constituency, people who work in drug treatment and members of the primary care trust. They are also concerned that the signal being sent to recreational cannabis users is that it is okay to smoke cannabis, as it has been reclassified. People are confused and the police are confused. I would like far more analysis of those areas where we know a problem exists and where there has been a focus on that problem but no proper analysis.

On that basis, I support my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham, who spoke to the new clause extremely competently. I hope that we will have a vote on it and that it will be the start of a campaign for the reclassification to be reversed.

Mr Tom Harris (PPS (Rt Hon John Spellar, Minister of State), Northern Ireland Office; Glasgow Cathcart, Labour)

I have sympathy with the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham and the spirit of the new clause, because the Government have a case to answer on the mixed signals that have gone out with the reclassification of cannabis.

A good example is what happened in Scotland last year. A number of ''entrepreneurs'' read the news about reclassification and decided that it would be perfectly in order for them to open a cannabis café in Edinburgh, simply by reading not what the law was but what the media reported the change in the law was. I might be wrong, but I remember that the café was called the Purple Haze café, and that it opened its doors to much publicity and did brisk business for almost 30 seconds before the police closed it down. There was talk of the same people opening a similar café in Glasgow, but fortunately Strathclyde police and Glasgow city council made it quite clear that that would of course not be allowed.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

That is a similar problem to that which my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) had in his constituency,   where people thought it perfectly legal to open a cannabis café.

Mr Tom Harris (PPS (Rt Hon John Spellar, Minister of State), Northern Ireland Office; Glasgow Cathcart, Labour)

I am sure that many hon. Members have suffered from the crossed lines that resulted from the Government's announcement. However, I do not think that the fact that people decided to take the wrong message was the Government's fault directly. There was a certain degree of deliberate misunderstanding of the message on the part of people pursuing their own purposes.

This is not the first time that it has been necessary to explain legislation rather than change it, and I am sure that the same arguments will be made in the House tomorrow. Sometimes it is better to explain and clarify existing legislation than it is to introduce a new clause and change it. When people deliberately misunderstood what the Government were trying to do, they did so for their own selfish reasons. They were a bit dishonest in claiming that the Government, in reclassifying cannabis from B to C, were somehow instituting the same kind of drug culture that exists in Amsterdam. That was clearly never the intention. It was never the effect in law. People who came to those conclusions are not being entirely honest.

The hon. Member for North-West Norfolk (Mr. Bellingham) claimed that there is no evidence so far that a change in police priorities to focus on hard drugs has had any major effect. I do not know what discussions he has had with his own chief constable, but I have received positive feedback from Strathclyde police about the measure that the Government introduced in 2003. I represent a part of Glasgow that has the highest heroin usage figures in western Europe, not just in the United Kingdom. It is a small city geographically and it has 16,000 chaotic drug users. Those are not cannabis users. They are certainly not khat users. They are heroin addicts who are responsible for the vast majority of theft, burglary and shoplifting.

As someone who holds regular surgeries and has to listen to people who have been the victims of drug-related crime, I am more than happy for the police to focus far more of their resources on the people who deal in and use hard drugs—although that is a slightly different matter—than on focusing disproportionate amounts of resources on those who deal in and use cannabis.

Mr Mark Todd (PPS (Rt Hon Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean, Minister of State), Foreign & Commonwealth Office; South Derbyshire, Labour)

Would my hon. Friend be surprised to find that although my constituency is very different from his, I have received no representations from my local police about confusion over this issue? Admittedly, I have not had entrepreneurs seeking to set up shops in Swadlincote to serve cannabis users in my area, but the police have said that they have a clear focus on the drug problems in South Derbyshire and are satisfied with the way that the law seems to function. We clearly get different messages from different people, with different motivations.

Mr Tom Harris (PPS (Rt Hon John Spellar, Minister of State), Northern Ireland Office; Glasgow Cathcart, Labour)

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The experience of other hon. Members leads to the same conclusion. In Scotland, the Government's message   was even further confused because the police cannot caution people. The situation for anyone who possesses cannabis in Scotland is exactly as it was before. They will be arrested and charged because they cannot be cautioned. The message came from the British media that this was a reclassification, but in practice nothing has changed in Scotland, which made the whole café fiasco even more bizarre.

The new clause is well intentioned. I would not seek to make party political capital here. Every Member wants the same ends. We all want to see a drastic reduction in the use of cannabis, heroin, khat or whatever, although we may disagree on the means of achieving that. I hope that over the next few months and years we can continue to have that dialogue. Part of that dialogue must surely be to consult on measures and to reclassify in either direction rather than simply to use the opportunity of this Bill without that consultation, which has helped us and informed us in the past. I hope that the hon. Lady will see fit to withdraw the new clause in the spirit of co-operation and in acknowledgment that the Government are trying to achieving the same ends as her party, albeit by different means.

Mrs Angela Watkinson (Shadow Minister, Education; Upminster, Conservative)

I support my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham on new clause 4, as I entirely share her views on the declassification of cannabis. The Government's policy is highly misguided. Cannabis is accepted as causing psychosis and depression, and it has a demotivating effect on students and in the workplace. One of its most harmful properties is the fact that it leads users on to other, harder drugs. I know that not every cannabis user progresses to harder drugs, but police say that almost every hard drug user started on cannabis. Notwithstanding all the other reasons, that reason alone should be sufficient to stop it being reclassified downwards from class B to class C.

My hon. Friend the Member for North-West Norfolk drew attention to the drug strategy progress report, which, in a paragraph headed ''Focusing efforts against Class A drugs by reclassifying cannabis'', says that arrests for possession of cannabis have fallen by 30 per cent.—of course they have, because people are not being arrested for possession—and that it has

''enabled police time to be released to deal with Class A drugs.'

That is the main focus of policy. I can think of no other offence where that could be used as a yardstick. For example, one would not say that because burglary was so prolific, one should no longer bother to enforce the law against it except when violence was used. I draw the comparison because cannabis use is so prolific and uses so much police time; the reason given for withdrawing the previous policy of arresting for possession was simply that there were so many cases.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham drew attention to a letter in The Daily Telegraph today, and I noticed a small article about cannabis use in today's edition of The Times. I am sure that the Minister is aware that the United Kingdom,   France and the Czech Republic have the highest incidence of cannabis use in Europe. The French Government are so concerned about the rising use of cannabis that they announced today that they have allocated €10 million to publicise its harmful effects. I hope that the Minister will compare that message from France with the message being given to young people here, many of whom believe not only that it is legal but, even worse, that it is harmless. That is the most difficult problem to overcome—they think that it is all right, that it does not matter, and that nothing will happen.

I am concerned about the comparative classification of drugs, even the classifications that we have given them in today's debate. Magic mushrooms are classified as class A. We learned in Tuesday's debate that codeine is classified as class B. We now have cannabis being classed as class C, along with steroids and valium. The comparative classifications are rather puzzling, and especially odd is the fact that cannabis is two classifications lower than magic mushrooms.

I ask the Minister to consider carefully the range of drug classifications—and particularly of cannabis, because it is now considered to be harmless and legal by so many young people who, if they develop the habit of taking it, are in danger of being introduced to other, harder drugs. We all know that many drug dealers are poly-drug dealers and have drugs other than cannabis for sale. Young people using cannabis will be offered harder drugs when they are buying. I support my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham in her quest for the reclassification of cannabis. I hope that new clause 4 will be put to the vote.

Mr Michael Clapham (Barnsley West and Penistone, Labour)

I rise to address the point made by the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk. He said that the Government's drugs strategy is not working as set out in the document he referred to. I want to make him aware that in my constituency and the other two constituencies across Barnsley the local crime and disorder reduction partnership commissioned Sheffield Hallam university to carry out a study, mapping the drug market. In so doing, it found that the drug market in Barnsley is basically made up of three levels: there is heroin, and most of our addicts are on heroin; we have a small group who use cocaine, but crack cocaine has not yet taken off; and we have a well embedded cannabis culture.

When the police were able to concentrate their efforts on the class A drug, rather than being tied up by concentrating efforts on the class C drug, cannabis, they were able to bring down crime. Much of the crime in Barnsley was acquisitive crime, generally carried out by class A drug users—heroin users. That concentration of police effort has reduced crime across the piece, but particularly burglary. Burglaries have fallen by 31 per cent. over this last year. Stealing from cars has been reduced by more than 22 per cent. Therefore, the concentration of effort away from cannabis to class A drugs in my crime and disorder reduction partnership locality has brought those improvements forward.

We have something in the region of 1,500 problematic drug users. They are heroin users. We   find little in the sense of problematic use of cannabis, although I have no doubt that when it is mixed with alcohol, it may well fuel antisocial behaviour. The big problem, however, is heroin. The focusing of effort by the police on tackling that class A drug has reduced crime enormously, and has made people feel safer on the streets. So I say to the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk that the Government's drug strategy is working.

Dr Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)

One of the things that is emerging from the drugs debate—not only this debate, but from all debates currently going on across communities—is that we need to look at the classification of drugs. I strongly agree with that. I assume that the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs will be the correct authority to do so.

The Co-ordination Centre for the Assessment and Monitoring of New Drugs Report—the so-called CAM report—that the Dutch produced when they were looking at the risks of psilocybin and psilocin carries out a very important risk analysis. We need to develop a system of risk analysis along these lines in this country, if we have not already got it. I do not know what the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs does itself. We need risk analysis that ladders drugs, from the top to the bottom. Then we tailor the punishment according to the harm that the drugs produce.

For example, with the two compounds that we discussed earlier—psilocybin and psilocin—the report gives four categories. ''Health of the individual'' got a 1.8 score, which is no risk. ''Risk to public health and society in general'' got a 2.9 score, a low risk. ''Risk to public order and security of the general public'' was given a score of 2.5 for those chemicals, again a low risk. ''Criminal involvement''? There was none in the case of psilocybin and psilocin. That was given a score of 1.8: no risk. Psilocin and psilocybin cannot be differentiated from each other, in the same way in which it is hard to differentiate between heroin and morphine, because one is converted into the other in the body. That puts paddos, which is what the Dutch call those two drugs, way below gammahydroxybutrate, which has caused concern in this country, and it puts it way below drugs such as heroin and morphine. We could adopt a similar procedure and risk analysis on all the illicit drugs that are classified according to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, and could punish people accordingly.

I speak against both new clauses for the following reasons. I admit that I do not know much about the use of khat, but it worries me that the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham has tabled new clause 1, which seeks to classify khat as a class A drug equal to morphine and cocaine. I say that I know nothing about khat, but I am sure that I would have known about it if it had been as harmful as morphine and cocaine.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

I am simply taking the lead from the Minister, who put magic mushrooms into class A.

Dr Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)

The hon. Lady heard what I had to say about that earlier, which is why I am arguing, as other   Members such as the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland have argued, that we really need to reconsider the classification of drugs and, as I say, develop some sort of risk analysis process to do that.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

Would the hon. Gentleman consider including in that risk analysis the results from the Brixton experiment? I do not want to knock any results that the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham) has had in his area, but the hon. Member for Vauxhall stated that the experiment in Lambeth led to drug dealers pushing harder drugs into the area using their cannabis client base. That would need to be part of the risk assessment, which completely defeats the argument deployed by the hon. Member for Bolton, South-East.

Dr Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)

I shall discuss Brixton and will answer that point in a moment.

The Government argue that all their legislation should be based on evidence and consultation. I ask the Minister and the hon. Lady what consultation we have had with the community that largely uses khat. Khat has been brought into this country by another culture, just as the West Indians brought cannabis into the country as part of their culture, music and traditions. We should consult widely, and not only with the Somalian community. We should also consult the ACMD and others who know far more about khat than any of us do on this Committee.

I do not accept the hon. Lady's suggestion that the Brixton experiment was an utter disaster. The problem was that it was conducted here in the capital in the full glare of publicity. There were television cameras, radio, and all the international media. It was an experiment that could never have succeeded in the way in which the hon. Lady wanted it to, because it received so much publicity that it sucked dealers into Brixton. It was not carried out on the quiet in a drug-using area of Manchester. Things were wrong with it, but so far as I could tell, things were also right with it. The police, for example, could concentrate on hard drugs, and they had some success, even in Brixton.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

How does the hon. Gentleman explain the fact that the Metropolitan Police chief, Sir John Stevens, said that he regretted the Brixton experiment?

Dr Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)

I do not want to comment on everything that the hon. Lady throws at me, because time is short.

Ms Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (reducing organised and international crime, anti drugs co-ordination and international and European issues), Home Office; Don Valley, Labour)

If I am correct, Sir John Stevens was actually making the point that my hon. Friend is making, which is that it might have been better on reflection to conduct the experiment across boroughs so that there was no displacement, rather than focusing on Brixton, because the media focus created problems. The experiment itself was not a problem; it was the way in which the media treated it, and the fact that it was conducted in isolation from other London boroughs. Does my hon. Friend agree?  

Dr Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)

Many myths have been quoted this afternoon, such as that cannabis causes mental illness and is a gateway drug to hard drugs—[Hon. Members: ''Where is the evidence?'']

It is not so much about where the evidence is, but about recognising that such statements are largely mythical. Let us take the issue of mental illness. The all-party group on drugs misuse carried out a dual diagnosis inquiry in which we discovered that about 42 per cent.—that figure is higher now—of the people in this country who misuse drugs are also mentally ill. Mentally ill people are predisposed to the use of drugs; it is not just that drugs make people mentally ill. Some drugs do make some people mentally ill, but that cannot be quoted as a generalisation, even with cannabis.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Dr Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)

I am sorry, but I cannot take any more interventions. I want to give the Minister time to respond to all my points.

I recommend a book by Zimmer and Morgan called ''Marijuana Myths, Marijuana Facts: A Review of the Scientific Evidence'', which is published by the Lindesmith Center. Bearing in mind the hon. Lady's current position on the Opposition Benches, I think that she ought to read that book if she has not done so, and consider the evidence that it presents. It presents a very balanced argument.

I shall try to deal with one final myth: cannabis is getting stronger. To which species of cannabis is the hon. Lady referring? There are 23 varieties. I made this point on Second Reading. She is referring to skunk, in which the tetrahydrocannabinol content is very high, but there are 23 varieties of cannabis, starting with ones with low THC content. In the Netherlands, the use of proper education allows people to start at the lower rather than the higher end of that spectrum. The problem with the sale of cannabis in Britain is that people do not know what they are buying on the street: one can even buy cannabis from Morocco that is full of camel dung.

Ms Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (reducing organised and international crime, anti drugs co-ordination and international and European issues), Home Office; Don Valley, Labour)

I will deal first with new clause 1. I understand the desire to protect families from the serious consequences of the misuse of khat. I recall that on Second Reading, my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Pound) spoke about his experiences of dealing with that problem in his constituency.

The misuse of khat is a particular problem in the Somali and Yemeni communities. Last year, I dealt with an Adjournment debate on khat, which was attended by representatives from those communities, and I had the chance to speak to them afterwards about their concerns. Linked to those communities is the geographical issue of where khat misuse is a problem, which is mainly in Liverpool, Cardiff, and west and east London. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) caught me in the Corridor the other day to talk about some of the problems there. Her concern, which is based on anecdotal evidence following her   discussions with the police, is that khat use may be extending beyond those traditional ethnic cultural communities.

There is little evidence that khat misuse is widespread, but that should not prevent us from considering its use as a matter of general concern, and as constituting a social problem. Usually, when we consider the issues surrounding controlled drugs, we look at them in the context of the wider population, but we should be mindful that khat use might be taking a hold within communities and causing severe problems.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

I am grateful to the Minister for looking on this matter sympathetically. In 2003, Customs and Excise estimated that between seven and 10 tonnes of the plant was being imported into the UK, but there is evidence that that figure is growing. Has the report that she promised been produced?

Ms Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (reducing organised and international crime, anti drugs co-ordination and international and European issues), Home Office; Don Valley, Labour)

I understand that the report will be published in May. We have asked the National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders to deliver on that, but I will say more about that later. I am conscious of time, and want to have time to speak about the cannabis issue.

Khat is a leaf that is traditionally chewed, but it can be made into tea. It is grown only in east Africa and southern Arabia. It gives the user a mild, amphetamine-like euphoria, and usually takes about half an hour of chewing to take effect. It is typically used by the older males in the family, for whom its use was traditionally a social activity. There are associated physical health problems, such as lack of sleep, food intake, related oral infections and an increase in levels of aggression. Colleagues have raised with me the issue of domestic violence associated with men using khat in a prolonged way.

The impact of khat is more social than physical. Not only is there the issue of domestic violence, but because of regular usage, men are unable to sustain themselves in work. There are therefore high levels of unemployment and such men are likely to be dependent on state benefits. That can create huge domestic tension, especially when spending money on khat becomes an economic drain on the family's income, and as I have said, it can cause increased aggression in the home.

We are keeping a close eye on the matter. Two pieces of separate research—one by Turning Point and the other by NACRO—that we have supported are being carried out into the impact of khat misuse. We look to the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs for advice on classified substances and controlled drugs. I am not in a position to say whether khat should be classified as a class A drug or at all. The question was last considered in 1988, and the ACMD has discussed the matter several times in more recent years.

Khat does not fit neatly into the usual profiles of drug misuse. We have spoken about a link between heroin, cocaine and crime, but there is no evidence of such a link for khat because it is not an illegal drug. That is not to say that there is not a good case for   controlling khat under the Misuse of Drugs Act. The best way ahead is to request the ACMD to undertake a comprehensive study on khat, especially in light of the latest research. I shall write to the chairman of the ACMD, Professor Sir Michael Rawlins, asking him to undertake such a study and to advise my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on its findings before the end of 2005.

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

I am disappointed because the Home Office's drugs and alcohol research unit was supposed to embark on a detailed study to assess the level of harm in September 2003, and a final report was due by September 2004.

I notice that we are getting towards the close of the Committee, so while I am on my feet I hope that the Minister agrees with me that we have been well served by all the members of the Committee and the staff who have been keeping watch over us, including the Hansard reporters, the Clerk, our two Chairmen and the Minister's officials, who were helpful to me during the initial stages of the Bill.

Ms Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (reducing organised and international crime, anti drugs co-ordination and international and European issues), Home Office; Don Valley, Labour)

I shall get my thank yous in quickly to you and your officials, Mr. Gale, to my officials and everyone who has served on the Committee for a stimulating and exciting debate on drugs, which I hope has been a learning curve for some. I am minded to ask the ACMD to advise us and go into detail on classification, but that should not stop what we are doing in the Home Office to engage with the communities concerned and carry out our own research.

As the hon. Lady indicated, I am not prepared to accept the new clause. I have listened to my hon. Friends the Members for Falkirk, West (Mr. Joyce), for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Harris), for Bolton, South-East and for Barnsley, West and Penistone, and it is clear from their experiences, which match our data, that the reclassification of cannabis has not resulted in the doom and gloom predicted by the Opposition.

The reality is that there has been approximately a one-third decrease in arrests for cannabis possession, and we have saved some 199,000 hours of police time nationally. There has been a rise in possession figures because street warning and confiscation are easier and more efficient than arrest. Reclassification has not stopped the police engaging with people using cannabis in the street; it has led to them confiscating more cannabis from people. As the police do not have to go through the process of arrest if it is not a case of flagrant abuse in the street, they have been eager to deal with it quickly there and then. In terms of young people's understandings, our evaluations show that 93 per cent. of under-18s understood that cannabis was illegal.

As long as the hon. Members for North-West Norfolk and for Upminster (Angela Watkinson) continue to peddle their distortions on what we have done in relation to cannabis—

Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)

On a point of order, Mr. Gale. I should like to vote on new clause 4. Could you advise on how best to achieve that?  

It being five minutes to Six o'clock, The Chairman proceeded, pursuant to Standing Order 83D and the Order of the Committee [27 January] to put forthwith the Question already proposed from the Chair.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 4, Noes 7.