The UK has just seen the launch of a big financially backed medical cannabis campaign, End Our Pain which has been seen in the national press this week, raised some cannabis enthusiasts hopes and ruffled some others feathers. But let’s look at the bigger picture.
We have seen a lot of comments both ways regarding the parliamentary report on medical cannabis and it’s recommendations for allowing medical use. We think it’s important to remember at times like this that unity will serve us better than squabbling. We can draw direct comparisons to California, Canada, and Germany. Study and look at the different ways their communities responded, and the results. Medical cannabis acceptance in the UK, however it is achieved, if it’s achieved, would be a step forward.
A change in schedule would benefit all regardless. Yes, studies show this increases the time that legal recreational takes, and yes, this won’t cover all conditions, nor be like the US dispensaries. It will be, at best, a Bedrocan like product alongside GW pharmas catalogue of course. It will also be likely that not much, if any of it, will be available on the NHS, especially at first. But it’s a start. And it will protect medical users from drug driving charges, allow those too scared, or unable, to break the law the ability to access cannabis. It will allow much better UK research. It will alter public opinion for the better. This is a good thing, but of course far from perfect.
There will be no mention of recreational rights, nor to share or consume socially. The request to allow patients to grow is unlikely to make it into law as we have been seeing with other European countries that are moving along a similar path towards pharmaceutical available cannabis. The way the community need to deal with this, and to push on wards and upwards, is to now concentrate on grow and share campaigns, like the UKCSC’s ‘Right To Grow’ campaign, that focuses on rights for all individuals and the right to grow cannabis, share it and collectively consumer cannabis. Without these three fundamentals, we cannot solve the problems of prohibition.
Use this national news on medical recommendations as a springboard to force the needed recreational, medical, and social reforms into the local and national discussions happening right now and help frame the debate. Use your club as a tool to be a voice in your community and your local press. In weeks such as these is worth remembering that the war is over but there are more battles to be fought to gain what we truly need. Prohibition is ending, for now it may be for just the few. This may not the first step some would have like to have seen taken in the UK, but it is a step. Now we fight to build the legal cannabis world we all want to see and live in. Together.
If we want to have an impact on the way things play out in the UK cannabis industry we must work together, act on our plans and keep driving the movement forward for the rights of individuals – and we can’t do that from the sidelines.
In November the UK Cannabis Social Clubs will be congregating with over 50 CSC’s, Collectives and Producers for their AGM to look at where we have come as a movement and where we are going if we all pull in the same direction, for there has never been a time more integral to support each other than now. There will never have been a unification of this magnitude among our community activists and it will be a groundbreaking occasion we hope sets a strong path for us all to walk down together over following 12- 18 months.
#Unity #Progress #Compassion #Educate #Legislate #Regulate #Medicate #Right2Grow
Stuart Harper and Greg de Hoedt
UK Cannabis Social Clubs
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