ACMD 2

The ACMD (UK's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs) is the government's statutory committee, which as the name suggests advises Ministers on illicit drug matters. It has a long and mostly distinguished history of providing top quality, objective and science-based views on illicit drugs, or on drugs which are thought to be risky and government thinks may need to be legislated against. Arguably its greatest day was its delivery of two reports in the mid-eighties on AIDS and drug misuse. If you can't be bothered to read these landmark reports then all you need to know is that the key point was that AIDS was/is more dangerous to individuals and society than drug misuse. The reports ushered in officially sanctioned harm-reduction measures such as needle exchange schemes, easy and free distribution of condoms and a huge drive to encourage drug users, especially injectors in to contact with specialist services. The result was a tiny rate of HIV infection amongst English and Welsh users (Scotland and NI went their own way) at around 2% compared with rates of up to 70% + in other countries.

But in the latter part of last year it reached a low point when it produced a report on Cannabis arguing that the drug should not be re-upgraded to Class B under the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act. It had been downgraded to C, the least dangerous category a few years before and use had declined. The ACMD argued that upgrading did not reflect its real risks (low compared to other illicit drugs) and would result in an increased attractiveness to potential users.

Unfortunately, the Prime Minister, a puritan wishing to flash his hard-man credentials and desperate to shore up a sinking premiership decided before the report emerged that it - the drug would be classified as a 'B'. This was a decision almost without precedent; minister(s) deciding on a view and action in advance of their own adviser's consideration. The ACMD disagreed, said 'no' to a regrade. The chairman of the committee was sacked for saying at a scientific lecture that cannabis was not as dangerous as horse-riding. And everyone wondered what the point of all advisory committees might be in the future.

Of course ministers are not obliged to agree with advisory committees' views, they have to take many other issues in to account when deciding on policy. But they chose to disagree about the science saying that Cannabis was a more dangerous drug than the committee thought it was. Had they come out and said, well, it does cause distress to a small number of people so on balance to avoid that we'll upgrade it; most people might not have agreed but would have taken the point. By choosing to argue the science rather than wider issues they shot themselves and the committee in the foot(s).

Now the sacked ACMD chairman, the wonderfully named psychiatrist, Professor David Nutt has set up his own independent ACMD whilst the actual one has a new chairman. The last thing drugs policy needs is yet another committee/pressure group/advisory council and no one will believe that future actual ACMD reports are a) truly independent of government pressure and b) paid any attention to by ministers. A sad decline from the brilliance and bravado of the AIDS reports.