New UK drugs bill

Yes all got a bit complicated now unfortunately and people not really knowing what their taking etc. suppose it's the only solution but as you mention the difficulty comes on the judging however considering how relitively soft drug laws are in reality cannot see it being s major problem.

However drug laws are massively out of date and the funny thing is that these laws have been brought in because the old laws brought about the legal highs problem.

So they really should just rip it all up and start with an open mind and a clean sheet of paper and actually try and get it right for all concerned

It's hardly surprising given the progress junk has made over the past fee years , knee jerk of any kindly has been lacking in my humble.

Folks can do what they want with their money don't get me wrong.. If it's free , it is costs then someone is making sponnies off illegal earnings.
Sooner or later gangs and gangsters get involved then quality goes down hill , and victims begin the litter the highways.

The free bit was a view not mine of course.

It's heavy handed , but was due , can't say I'm surprised ...people will go away eventually whether it makes any difference depends on ... The infra and resource ( read money put into tracking down and pushing the sourcers into the gutter. Won't happen I know ...

As a news story it was emotional but not factual , if people go away and other ' benefits ' appear then you might have a yardstick , for now it's fiction.

Snafu .. Can't make money from it so neither can anyone else, that's the deal... And the cost of not doing anything... Well it bread the bill.

When will government realize they'll never win "the war on drugs"? Legalize everything, tax it, and put the funds towards educating the population.

This is going to be yet another fine example of sloppy law making.

as *an example of political leaning* as I am, I dont think a legalise the lot will work, for any number of reasons, not least the lack of education about drucks. Its a pretty bad start when the legalised drucks like Alchohol are subject to full on lobbying by the piss manufacturers and a sort of half way house of DrinkAware exists in the Uk ( for those outside the UK, this is a a control body to educate people about drinking. except it run by the brewers and distillers- see what I mean). Given that precedent, its unlikely there will ever be totes unbiased messages about anything else that could possibly be legalised.

As much as I am not fan of of the coppery, I cant see them being too enamoured with pressure to make more drucks arrests to keep the numbers up ( this new legislation relates mostly to the supply side, as consumption side is much too complex to hsve a one line piece of legislation to cover it - but im sure if it could be done it would be).

What the new legislation does do, is to provide whoever another draconian set of powers that have *probable abuse* written all over them. Remember the Riots of 2011? people getting serious stretches for appallingly trivial misdaemenours. What we dont want is another tranch of the dispossesed being excluded from education and career opportunities because of youthful stupidity- this law will not reduce drucks use, but will produce more drug convictions.These two themes are assumed to be related by twisted logic, but it doesnt always follow. The convictions will Invariably be skewed in the direction of one side of society if past performance is anything to go by

It makes me weep, it really does. I am advocating neither caning it nor abstinence I have to add...

what? Please tell me this doesn't include Nurofen Plus, otherwise I'm canceling my trip to London

People always talk about making drugs legal and tax them etc etc. I have taken drugs years ago and probably took too many at the time and I ask you this, if as a parent your child could get hold of drugs legally would you be happy to let them take them? There's not doubt recreational use of drugs on a non regular basis can be a way of gaining a different than conventional way of life experience. However, I have watched quite a few of my old group of friends who started on party products end up on heroin and crack cocaine. They were experienced drug takers who regularly took Class A party drugs who had seen other people loss their grip on reality from taking these drugs. Legalisation will never happen. We all talked about cannabis being legal in 10 years time 20 years ago. Decriminialisation of possession was one step to this but I cannot see any of the established drugs, non legal highs, being legalised anytime soon. Is this right or wrong, I still don't know.

I have open discussion with the kids about drugs and recently they worked out that I did cane it for a while- as did everyone else in my cohort. None of my lot wound up on horse or crack, but maybe thats another discussion and worthy of academic referencing to make it worthwhile.I would prefer the kids to eat and consume healthily in as far as that is possible but accept that humans are biologically pre determined to push out the boat on occasions.

In terms of the socio-economic impact, Some places are now in the midst of a dercrim for posession period and the studies are starting to come through with decent research to back up  the findings. Portugal is probabaly the nearest to us worthy of note and skag use ( and its consequences )  has reduced by up to 50% deoending on what you read. Other findings are that more people - esp kids- have tried weed during this period- there is no statistically verifiable link between one type of use leading to another yet, despite the rumblings of the agenda driven lot. INterestingly, as alcohol llicencing laws have been relaxed since the 90s in the Uk, more kids are getting stuck in to drinking earlier, but again, we should  be wary of linking the two without any academic rigour.The effects of the criminilsation of opiates and their removal from script availability in the UK is well documented as it has been so long ago - and argueable , that move has not really shown any positive benefits. I am happy to discuss this BTW, its something I did some research on a long  long time ago

having come from a shithole northern city where drinking is a way of life, I am warier of the lincrease in the demon drink personally . ideally, this comes back to my initial posts, it would be preferable for society not to have any neuro stimulator abuse going on - be it alchohol, tobacco, legal highs. weed, coke , sugar, etc ad nauseum. realpolitik would provide education so people can make their choices. harsh penalties do not work- as a visitor to north korea several times and knowing people who work out there, the drug laws are maxxed- usually death - yet the population is thumping crystal meth is massive quantities, mostly unknown to the outside world. if a vicious totalitarian hermit state is unable to keep on top of the drug problem by use of the death penlty, then it doesnt bode well for the more liberal societies following a similar route of increasing prohibition.

there is no absolute right or wrong on this, just opinion.

 

sory for my spellings, its not my forte

Things like gas and glue won't really be affected with this ban and there 2 of the trippiest things out there when inhaled. It's crazy. There just going to open a whole new can of worms and course more damage to society. They need to decimalise and regulate cannabis, mushrooms (again) ecstasy and cocoa leaf and like someone said the money needs to be put into educating the youths on the dangers of real drugs like alcohol, tobacco etc and proper research needs to be done on the drugs to get the full medicinal benefits. Just look at the advancements in cancer treatments and for people with epilepsy and ms to name a few in the us were states have decrimalised

Whilst it might be a sweeping assumption, I'd guess that the urban art buying demographic is largely populated by by blokes between 35-45ish.

I have no doubt that there's the odd older one

I also reckon that a bit of present and past social mobility is required to get properly involved in the first place. Personally speaking, I've dabbled (never horse..but never is a long time) but came out the other side reasonably satisfactorily, a little bit of unnecessary aggression from time to time but if you are going to completely go ballistic and take the wrong path then you will and whether or not it's legal, taxed or whatever has no bearing on the decision making process. You either will, or won't.

For those reasons, I'm in favour of legalisation, control and education. Not in that order.....