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Regulation of Cannabis

May I point out that the only Conservative member of the Home Affairs Committee who voted against the reclassification when we met on 9 May 2002 to decide on our report and recommendations was the hon. Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson), who took a consistent line? As my right hon. Friend said earlier, the present Leader of the Opposition supported the reclassification and abstained on the question of whether cannabis should be legalised. Our report stated that some 44 per cent. of people had taken the drug at some point in their lives. I deplore that. I wish that people would not start taking drugs of any kind. We do not want our children to do so, and I hope that we can send a message throughout the country about how dangerous it is to start taking drugs. However, our report also pointed out that 120,000 deaths had been caused in one year alone by smoking, and that thousands of avoidable deaths were caused each year by alcohol abuse. Those drugs are all of a kind. We should deplore excessive use of alcohol and excessive smoking, as well as use of the ordinary drugs to which my right hon. Friend has referred.