Entrepreneurs urged to grab a slice of cannabis pie

BLACK PEOPLE criminalised by cannabis should be first in line to benefit from legalisation, according to a drug reform expert.

assandra Frederique, e ecutive director of Drug Policy Action in the S, spoke on a visit about decriminalisation in the S, which has opened up a multi-billion dollar market.

With medicinal cannabis predicted to be worth £1 billion in the UK by 2026 – and much more if legalisation occurs – she said it was crucial Black British entrepreneurs get organised to ensure the com- munity reaps the benefits, not ust global corporations. s Frederique, a aitian-born frican- merican, addressed s and a community meeting in a bid to spread the US experience of getting a slice of the pie, after states legalised the recreational use of mari uana, and resident oe Biden declared a federal pardon for all convictions.

Experts believe legalisation in ritain is only a matter of time, with corporations already preparing to cash in on a lucrative future market, including ex-Prime Minister Theresa ay s husband, hillip, as a shareholder of GW Pharmaceuticals.

Ms Frederique told The Voice it was important to prevent “corporate capture , and that those who were criminalised should get the first licences to sell the drug legally, adding: “If corporations take over we know black people will lose.”

“As we build this conversation around cannabis reform in the , conversations about restitution for people who have been criminalised needs to be centred.”

Black people were 12 times more likely to be prosecuted for cannabis possession, according to analysis in 2021. inistry of ustice figures show that 41 percent of all arrests for possession in England and Wales were of lack people, who make up ust four per cent of the population

The conviction rate is continuing to rise despite softening public attitudes, and police chiefs are resisting demands for police to cease stopping and searching based on the smell of cannabis alone.

Using the latest population census data, we found that one in every four black voters had a Conservative MP who was defending a thin majority.

This potential electoral power could be enough to decide who gets the keys to Number 10 at the next general election.

Watch the full interview at www.voice-online.co.uk

IDON’T KNOW why, but I’m not really feeling it. Maybe it will change when it’s all over and done with and everybody starts saying ‘Hail, hail rock and roll, long live King Charles.’ Maybe.

But I’m not so sure. You know when you feel something you feel it. And when you don’t, well, you don’t. And since the late Queen died, this monarchy thing has not been the same for me as when she was alive.

All this despite the fact that Charles has bent over backwards to be a king for Black Britons. To give him his due, he was quick to jump on that Lady Susan Hussey race row business when the lady in question asked the Black guest, Ngozi Fulani, where she was really, really from.

Since then of course, Lady Hussey and Ms Fulani have kissed and made up and agreed that the whole thing was a misunderstanding.

I don’t know what HRH’s role in the reconciliation was but now that he’s on the throne, he was always going to be the ultimate decision maker. As Susan Hussey is now back in the royal fold, I’m presuming it’s all quiet on the Black front.

That was a good look. I have to admit. I didn’t think that he would pull that one off. But he did so I should be giving him props.

But when it comes to rubbing it in that they are bluer-blooded whereas the rest of us, if you cut us do we not bleed red? Maybe it’s that. Maybe I’m just jealous. I don’t think I am, but some Freudian psychiatrist will no doubt tell me that, despite my protestations to the contrary, that I am just jealous because my blood is not blue.

Shocked

Swear to God, it’s not true. But this is the same shrink that insisted that I must have seen my parents engaging in romantic coupling when I was a baby in the cot.

He reckons that is why I am psychopathological. And he knows because Sigmund Freud told him that is always the case.

Whenever someone’s head is not coming correct, look to see if they slept in the same room as their parents when they were a baby. And now, because my head is not in the right place vis-à-vis the coronation, my psychiatrist is blaming my parents.

My old man would be shocked if he heard what I was paying the shrink to come up with that conclusion, and that psychiatrists were making so much more money than him.