"The harm to neighbourhoods that is increasingly associated with illegal cultivation and trade in cannabis provides a challenge for law enforcement within the United Kingdom.
"The police service is responding to that challenge, with more raids on cannabis farms than we have seen previously and a tougher approach to policing cannabis on the street.
"We now want to step up action against the organised crime networks that are involved in the cannabis trade."
But a 42 year old truck driver from South Wales, who used cannabis to rid himself of a dangerous and expensive 20 year alcohol habit, isn't convinced by what he calls the 'tired and well used rhetoric' which has been used to announce the appointment of Mr Matthews.
"We've heard it all before" is Ian Malley's response to the job announcement.
42 year old Ian Malley from Cardiff, has spent the last 25 years driving trucks across Europe as well as, in his own words, "trying to earn a living despite the best efforts of the British government to shut down the British Road Haulage industry with higher taxes on vehicles, on road fuel and on road fund licences."
5 years ago, he decided enough was enough, and he gave up driving trucks to concentrate on kicking his alcohol habit.
His father was also a driver who enjoyed a drink, until he died from cancer of the liver and it was with this in mind Ian Malley devised a plan which he believes, saved his life.
"I set up a small box in my back garden and grew three cannabis plants", he admits freely.
"It wasn't what I would call a success by any stretch of the imagination but I managed to harvest 4 ounces of dry cannabis, and with my weed safely ensconced in a sealable glass jar, I set off for a marathon camping trip to Pembrokeshire, taking only a tent and cooker, a surfboard, a wetsuit and a mountain bike."
Beating the booze
"Simply saying to myself 'I'm giving up the drink' wasn't enough" he says with conviction. "I needed to totally remove myself from my immediate social circle. Start life afresh".
6 months on and Ian Malley returned to his mothers house in Cardiff late one November night, after fierce Atlantic gales reduced his tent to nylon shreds.
He was 5 stone lighter and 6 months "dry", and he hasn't had a drink since.
A huge personal success which he puts firmly down to using cannabis as a substitute for alchol.
He explained how easy it was to get hooked on booze.
"Its all about the buzz right? Basically once you are addicted to how a drug like alcohol makes you feel, you're hooked. It starts off innocently enough, with a drink after a days work. But before you know it you are having a drink after every days work. Sometimes two or three drinks (and a couple at lunchtime too?) and its a slippery slope from that point forth."
"Stopping off in the pub on a Friday soon becomes a daily ritual and if you are drinking daily, you have a drink problem although whether you will actually admit this to yourself is another matter".
I can handle it..can't I?
He says he was able to ignore the symptoms of alcoholism as a result of the stresses involved with continental road haulage.
"Myself and a bunch of colleagues were involved in the last throws of the Welsh steel industry, delivering the finished steel coils all over Europe and beyond, and it would be fair to admit we were pissed pretty much most of the time."
"We had well stocked fridges in our trucks which would have put many exclusive hotel mini-bars to shame".
Dambusters
"We would work sometimes 20 hours a day - three round trips per week from South Wales, to Germany, Switzerland or France was nothing out of the ordinary, sleeping only when waiting for a ferry. It got to the stage we were back and forth to Germany with such monotony we called ourselves 633 squadron - The Dambusters."
"Tip a load of steel in Germany and home in time for breakfast" was their motto, and it must have been quite a sight seeing a convoy of trucks driven by drivers wearing leather flying helmets and goggles". "But no matter how many laws we broke, we couldn't make Welsh steel profitable" "After spending 18 hours listening to the roar of a 500 brake horse power diesel engine beneath you it was hard to switch off immediately, and with only two or three hours sleep available until the ferry boarded, a couple of beers before bed is an easy habit to get into."
"Alcohol is everywhere cannabis prohibition is, and if you are having problems with the demon drink, the temptation for "the buzz" is hard to resist", he explains.
I asked him how he sees the appointment of the governments cannabis co-ordinator? His answer was brutally frank!
"With all due respect to Mark Matthews what is it he expects to do that others before him, such as Keith Hellawell or Julian Critchely were unable to?" Reduce cannabis users? Its not going to happen is it? Every single expert think tank agrees prohibition is not the way to oversee a nations drug policies". "And while he's doing whatever he intends to do, what about me and the tens of thousands like me who paid into the governments "booze is cool" campaign, or my father and tens of thousands like him, who bought into the last governments campaign on behalf of the big-spending alcohol lobby, and who paid the ultimate price for doing so with his life?"
Home-Grown is Safest for the sake of quality and purity
"When I grew my own cannabis I was fully aware of the risks which came with using a substance certain high ranking government ministers deemed perfectly acceptable just a few short years ago". "I'm 42 years of age for heavens sake, and responsible enough to make my own mind up on a substance which has the backing of 12 US states which run medical marijuana programs, and which the next president of the United States freely admits using when he was a student, and he did ok for himself wouldn't you say?"
"In America the 'Leukemia and Lymphoma Society' have given their support to the use of cannabis. The American College of Physicians and its 214,000 practising doctors have publicly backed the use of cannabis, as has the British Multiple Sclerosis society."
"President Bill Clintons Surgeon General Doctor Joycelyn Elders is a respected paediatrician in Arkansas, and she said recently, that the efficacy of cannabis in medicine has been proven beyond resonable doubt, leaving us needing only to research the safest delivery routes, and without a single mention of cannabis psychosis - a condition which seemingly only prevails in the UK".
"Doctor Tod Mikuriya MD was a respected psychiatrist in California, until his death in 2007. Dr Mikuriya was a pioneer who championed the use of cannabis as a substitute for alcohol and many of his case studies are available to read online".
And all this freely available information on the Internet, according to Ian Malley, is the biggest task Mark Matthews faces as the UK's latest "Cannabis Tsar".
The truth is out
"I've had almost 40 years of British drugs education and being a child of the seventies I was a paid up member of the Grange Hill "Just say no" campaign right from the start, which was run in conjunction with America's then first lady, Nancy Regan, who fronted a campaign of the same name".
"We were told in no uncertain terms, cannabis was a killer and yet the fact is thats a lie. Cannabis is illegal because..
The reason cannabis is and will remain illegal has little to do with public health and everything to do with big business, so how many other lies have I been told"?
"I was told that once I was 18 I was able to go into the Royal George public house at the end of my street. Living in inner-city Cardiff we had little else to look forward to except getting into the pub at as early an age as possible. Little did I realise those covert drinking soiree's would ultimately cost me two marriages, two house repossessions, and two children who although they're aged 18 and 21 today, they hardly know me, nor I them."
"Today I'm forced to sit through Eastenders, or Coronation Street, each of which is built around a pub, encouraging people to drink more,and a quick change of channel shows the aftermath of those that choose to drink more than they can handle, as camera crews trail our police forces around British town centre's, as they attempt to get to grips with a beligerent public fired up on cheap, widely available fighting juice. Whilst the substance I used to rid myself of alcohol is at the centre of a witch hunt which sees government policy decided upon and written on the front pages of the Daily Mail."
"Once an alcoholic always an alcoholic as the saying goes or as Radio 1 shock jock Chris Moyles puts it, "we're only one glass away from heaven".
"Of course the irony is Paul Gascoigne used to hang out with Chris Moyles, Chris Evans, Danny Baker etc, and look where alcohol abuse has got him"?
"No, I'll stick with the "risks" involved with using cannabis, and leave the booze to those that can handle it" concludes Ian Malley.
I asked Ian about his plans for the future, and would he consider growing cannabis again, in spite of the tougher cannabis laws which are set to be implemented early next year? His answer surprised me.
"If Jacqui Smith, Vernon Coaker or cannabis co-ordinator Mark Matthews will debate the cannabis issue with me; will tell me exactly what harm I'm doing to myself or indeed to anyone else, by growing and consuming cannabis in the privacy of my own home, using science based evidence as opposed to scare stories, then perhaps I'll listen to what they have to say."
"On the understanding they listen to what I have to say too".
But the truth is, there is no evidence. In fact as former Home Office drugs advisor Julian Critchley announced recently all the evidence points towards decriminalisation, but the truth is thats going to cost the government too much money in lost alcohol revenues, and money is something they don't have much of at the moment".
"The Daily Mail will run story after story which read cannabis "may" do "this", or cannabis "could" cause "that", but myself, and many millions before me have tried it, and it didn't cause "this", nor did it cause "that?
In fact, in 2008, peanuts, natural latex and Porsche 911's will each harm more people than cannabis. But do we ban those"?
"I paid taxes on everything I ever used to grow cannabis, including the seeds. 30% of the price went to the government as I bought them from a British company, quite legally. My compost comes from the garden centre, tax paid. My electricity was always paid for, and has recently sky-rocketed in price so as far as I'm concerned I'm paying my way".
"So my choice is cannabis over alcohol and I would like to know what Mr Matthews plans to do about differentiating between indiginous, VAT paying members of our community who choose to grow a couple of plants for their own use, and the organised criminals that take advantage of the bouyant markets prohibition provides for their wares, growing sometimes hundreds of plants in a single grow operation"?
"I think its fair to say I speak for literally millions of British citizens who choose to use cannabis, and who have access to all the facts by virtue of the global communications opportunities we have from the Internet.
No truth thank you..we're British
The truth is out, and unless we plan on following the draconian federal US laws which sees 1 in 99 US citizens in prison on a simple marijuana possession charge, someone needs to open up communications with the indiginous British cannabis community with a view to implementing some long term plans for education and harm reduction."
"Its either that, or Jack Straw needs to get a move on with those "Titan" prisons, because from February next year we're going to need them as 10,000 more cannabis convictions are presented before the courts every single year".
"Will it be cannabis czar Mark Matthews who opens communications?
Only time will tell but I won't be holding my breath." Related:
Medical Marijuana Endorsed by Leukemia and Lymphoma Society
American College of Physicians Urges Review of Marijuana's Legal Status
President Clintons Surgeon General: An interview with Dr. Joycelyn Elders
Cannabis as a Substitute for Alcohol by Dr Tod Mikuriya MD Canna Zine - Daily zine for the global cannabis scene - Join us! |
