Pro-reform Conservative MP Dr Dan Poulter believes ‘we are winning the argument’ on access to medical cannabis.
Speaking at Prohibition Partners Live, the clinician and politician said he believes policymakers are listening but that the machinery of government is doomed to be slow-moving when it comes to change.
Appearing in a discussion alongside Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi and Drug Science founder Professor David Nutt, Poulter argued for Whitehall reform to speed up the process.
He said: “The concern for me is you still find a concern among politicians generally about the conflation of cannabis in medical use and the wider criminal justice issues.
“We’re beginning to win that argument and move the debate to a more sensible place but there is still that backdrop.
“I think we’ve got to be frank that because of Covid, and though we want to go much faster, the Department for Health has had other priorities.
“We need to put our foot on the accelerator now…and look at those barriers that are still in place.”
He added: “This conflation of criminal justice issues with broader medical issues need to be wrestled away from Home Office and Ministry of Justice and make sure it’s a health issue, that’s the biggest challenge.
“We’ve got to move this completely away form those government departments in Whitehall that are linked to prohibition and drug control and move it to healthcare regimes.
“I think we are winning the argument but we now need to see the mechanics put into place.”
Antoniazzi said she believes ‘the mindset of the public is changing – but the government isn’t coming with us’.
The Welsh MP wondered if the British government is hesitant because liberalisation in the medical sphere might ‘lead on to other conversations’ about wider use.
She said: “Every step the government makes is in the right direction…all be it very slowly.
“They are worried about opening the floodgates to a market and world that they can’t regulate and control and that is the concern they have and I just think it’s a great shame.”
Antoniazzi added that finding support in Westminster can be ‘like hitting your head against a brick wall’ but that it is coming to the surface.
She said: “The support is there, cross-party…the willingness and ability to change things on the regulatory side. There are massive stumbling blocks and we’re working hard to identify what they are.”
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