A UK company, G W Pharmaceuticals, which markets ingredients extracted from the cannabis plant has recently raised $101.1 million on the US NASDAQ market.
It has been illegal for ordinary people to grow cannabis in the UK since 1971, despite its well documented medicinal properties, and has been a class C drug for most of the time since it was initially banned in 1925. Possession of cannabis still carries a prison sentence.
Pippa Bartolotti, Wales Green Party Leader said today, “It is plainly contradictory to let a large corporation make massive profits out of this useful medicinal plant, when sufferers of epilepsy, MS, cancer and other painful conditions are criminalised for using it.
“The hemp plant is one of our most versatile and useful plants. Banning it has always been short-sighted. Plastics made from hemp can be completely bio-degradable, and have the potential to reduce oil consumption and the processing of petrochemicals. Even better they enrich the soil they are grown in, proving that this is one of the most ecologically sustainable plants in the world.”
The criminalisation of cannabis was rooted in prejudice born of racism and fear in the beginning of the 20th Century. Before that time cannabis was found in most remedies in every family cabinet, particularly in Victorian England and the USA.
The Wales Leader added “It is clear that the criminalisation of cannabis continues today to protect corporate profits, not to protect the health of people, because even the Governments own reports say cannabis is barely addictive and certainly not a killer. It is highly irresponsible of Government to continue to leave young people at the mercy of the black market, resulting in exposure to harder drugs. We need to decriminalise cannabis urgently.”
Possession and intent to supply cannabis carries a maximum prison sentence of fourteen years. In comparison, the maximum sentence for attempted sexual intercourse with a girl under 13 is seven years.
The latest estimate from the NHS Health and Social Care Information Centre for the UK is that, in 2011, 79,100 people died in England from deaths caused by smoking. 8,748 people died from alcohol-related death. Cannabis is implicated in 23 deaths in England and none in Wales.