Peter Reynolds

Last year, as chair of the Adult-Use sub group of the Cannabis Industry Council, I was literally screamed at to “shut up” when trying to raise the issue in the executive committee. I fully understood that importers of prescription cannabis felt their monopoly of legal cannabis supply was threatened but today I see those same people using the Tyson and ‘Big Narstie’ brands to promote their medical products.

It’s clear that avarice and greed are now driving the provision of prescription cannabis services in the UK. Apart from the crass misuse of inappropriate brands, I see more and more people who claim to be prescribed 60 or 90 grams per month and invited to ‘pick and choose’ from a range of different flower products. The number of patients in the UK who have a legitimate need for such quantity is very small. But don’t take my word for it. Take note of the ‘Good Practice Guide‘ issued by the Medical Cannabis Clinicians Society in July 2024. Predictably, perhaps, the response to this from importers of cannabis products and others was angry and vituperative.

I don’t need to explain the widespread concern at using the name of a convicted rapist for a medical product. As for ‘Big Narstie’, due respect to him as a patient in his own right but I hardly think that ‘grime comedy’ is appropriate for promoting medicine. When we finally get adult-use legalisation in the UK, I’d encourage him to get involved and he’ll probably do well.

I have some sympathy for anything that circumvents the ridiculous law that prohibits cannabis for adults. While some borderline prescribing was acceptable in my judgement, within reasonable limits, it now threatens the legitimacy of the entire prescription cannabis industry. If these greedy, short-sighted fools don’t get themselves in order, the regulators are going to intervene.

The lessons here are for the importers who dominate supply of prescription cannabis. Understandably, they take a much shorter term view than the few who are now introducing UK-based cultivation. I am certain that the domestic supply chain will be much more responsible as they have the future in mind. Clinics which are involved in excessive and ‘recreational-style’ prescribing also need to think about the long term.

I spent 40 years of my life campaigning for legal access to cannabis as medicine and, by accident rather than design, the 2018 regulations provide the most progressive and flexible system for prescribing cannabis anywhere in the world. It would be a terrible thing to lose this through abuse of the system for short term greed.

Medical use of cannabis is entirely legitimate, life-changing for many, life-saving for some. Adult-use of cannabis is also legitimate in principle, if not yet legal in law.

With common sense it’s easy enough to access cannabis for adult-use without putting oneself in great legal peril. The argument for legalisation is about liberty but most importantly about fighting the massive harms of the gangster-dominated criminal market.

Of course, between medical use and adult-use, there is some blurring at the margins but it’s prudent to separate the two and be disciplined about it.