Legalise cannabis, don’t criminalise communities

Anti-prohibition campaigner calls for reform: free the people not just the herb

By Maurice Mcleod

CANNABIS PROHIBITION has had a massively negative impact on Black communities in Britain since its introduction in 1971.

But ending prohibition will not be enough to fix the damage, according to leading drug policy advocates.

As a growing number of countries around the world move to end the prohibition of cannabis, Britain will surely eventually jump on the bandwagon.

There are a multitude of ways cannabis can be decriminalised and it is important we learn the lessons from around the world, say Release, national drug law experts, and UNJUST UK, who tackle systemic racism in the criminal legal system.

Despite the stereotypes, Black people do not smoke cannabis any more frequently than their white peers, but bias in the way the drug is policed means the negative impacts are concentrated in poor communities in general and Black communities in particular.

Every year around 500,000 people are stopped and searched by the police. Black young men are stopped at nine times the rate of their white counterparts, and Home Office figures show almost two thirds (63 per cent) of these stops are because an officer suspects someone of drug offences.

In most cases of Stop and Search (71 per cent), nothing at all is found, but on the occasions when cannabis is found, Black people are around six times more likely to be arrested than their white peers.

There has been a tenfold increase in the number of possession offences for cannabis since the mid-1970s.

Cannabis criminalisation has devastating consequences for Black communities, hinder- ing future job opportunities, impacting on housing, access to education and breaking up families.

Even Black people who do not smoke cannabis are impacted by increased police surveillance, violence linked to the illegal market, and the impact on loved ones.

Streatham MP Bell RibeiroAddy hosted a Parliamentary meeting last month, presented by Release and UNJUST UK, which featured prominent advocates in drug policy reform, including Kassandra Frederique, who has led the campaigns in New York. Ms Ribeiro-Addy said at the event “Cannabis is sometimes described as a gate way drug. There is zero evidence this is the case. What is true is can nabis prohibition is a gateway to the criminal legal system for many Black people.”

Ms Frederique explained her battle wasn’t to decriminalise cannabis, it was to decriminalise a community.

“It wasn’t about freeing a plant; it was about freeing the people. About figuring out how do we actually decriminalise communities,” she said.

Release argued that cannabis decriminalisation in the UK has to expunge all cannabis-related criminal records, must provide access to the new legal market for Black communities and that some of the revenue which will be made in taxes needs to go back into communities hardest hit by the prohibition.

Calls for drug law reform have been gaining momentum, but there is still a long way to go. UNJUST UK believes communities most impacted by cannabis prohibition should be at the heart of designing the new legislation and will work to amplify the voices of Black and racialised communities.

Read more www.release.org.uk/ publications/cannabis-regulating-right, www.unjust.org.uk