Cannabis cafes would curb alcohol consumption by 25 percent, advisor tells British MPs

A former government advisor on drugs told British MPs Tuesday that the implementation of "Dutch-style" cannabis cafes would curb alcohol use by up to 25 percent, the Guardian reported. 

Professor David Nutt, who was dismissed from his advisory post in 2009 for opposing ministers' decision to upgrade marijuana from a class C to class B drug, has been a consistent advocate for the decriminalization of drugs, the Huffington Post UK reported.

"A regulated market for illicit drugs would be the best way, and we could reduce alcohol consumption by as much as 25 percent if we had the Dutch model of cannabis cafes," said Prof. Nutt, according to the Guardian. "The drug trade is the second biggest international trade in the world, after oil, and it is completely unregulated … It is impossible to win the war on drugs."

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Nutt was testifying before the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee as part of their inquiry into Britain's drug policy, according to the Guardian.

Recent official figures showed that though illicit drug use in the UK has been decreasing steadily since 2000, alcohol consumption has increased drastically over the same period, particularly among the region's youth, according to the Huffington Post.

"I think people have a very exaggerated perception of the harms of drugs and they tend to minimize the harms of other activities — which particularly young people engage in — that are potentially as harmful or more harmful," Prof. Nutt, who is now the chairman of the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs, told the MPs, the Independent reported. 

Nutt also argued that the British government's drug policies were motivated by politics rather than science, the Daily Record reported. He stood by his earlier controversial comments in which he argued that doing ecstasy was just as dangerous as horseback riding, according to the Daily Record. 

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"The reason the Misuse of Drugs Act was set up in the first place was to stop people playing politics with drugs," Prof. Nutt said, according to the Record. "It's easy to score political points around drugs and that's why we have ratcheted up sanctions and classes over the last 40 years, and people have not had the courage to say, 'no, it's wrong.'"

Professor Les Iversen, the current chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, also testified before the committee, and suggested a reduction in the penalties for drug possession, according to the Huffington Post. 

Since the Misuse of Drugs Act was passed in 1971, only one drug – cannabis – had ever been downgraded in classification, and the move was quickly reversed despite the Advisory Committee's recommendations, the Guardian reported.

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