SACKED government drugs adviser Professor David Nutt last night defended his controversial views in a guest lecture.
Prof Nutt, who famously labelled horse riding more dangerous than ecstasy, spoke at Newcastle University as part of the Insights public lecture series.
And the scientist refused to back down on his stance on banned substances as he spoke to the packed lecture hall.
Prof Nutt, who was sacked from his position as chairman of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) in 2009, told the crowd: “Tonight will not be without controversy, as it is in my nature. We are interested in drugs, we like to hear about other people taking them, but we are scared to talk about it when they affect our day-to-day lives.”
In the lecture, entitled Science and Politics in Drug Policy: Past Conflicts and Future Opportunities, Prof Nutt stood by his ranking of alcohol and tobacco as more harmful drugs than cannabis, ecstasy, or MDMA.
He explained how the health and social costs of drink – with three people a week dying of alcohol overdoses, rocketing alcohol-related hospital admissions, and up to 10% of accidents due to intoxication – made it among the most harmful substances around. But he claims the government don’t want to tackle the alcohol issue because drinking is so engrained in our society.
“It is a question of science versus policy,” Prof Nutt said. “They said that I, as a scientist, was getting involved in policy decisions. But at the present time, the laws are not based on the science, so they are potentially unjust.
“The Government decided to focus on drugs as a smoke screen to avoid dealing with the major issue, alcohol. The fundamental tension is society’s refusal to see alcohol as a drug.
“But if alcohol had been invented now, it would almost certainly be made an illegal substance.”
Instead of tackling Britain’s drink problem, Prof Nutt says, politicians cling to drug scare-stories, such as recent high-profile concerns over Mephedrone, or “Miaow Miaow”.
“Mephedrone was banned before we had any proven deaths from it. Most of those reported turned out to be caused by something else.
“But during the year when it was a popular drug, deaths from cocaine fell by half, saving around 40 lives.
“Giving evidence to the Home Office Select Committee, Vernon Coaker admitted that ‘we look for evidence to support out policy decisions’ – not the other way round.”
Prof Nutt says that his sacking was a direct result of his suggestion to ministers that the logic of the drugs classification system was flawed.
He has now formed the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs with other ex-ACMD scientists, and still maintains that some drugs should be moved into lower classes – or even made legal .
He claims the current classification system risks ruining hundreds of lives by criminalising people. For example, people caught with cannabis, now Class B, could face up to five years in prison – even if it was for medicinal use.
“The policy criminalises people, and doing that changes the trajectory of their lives dramatically,” Prof Nutt said. “They get a criminal record for possession of a personal supply, but that is something which really has very little impact on their health or society. We are imprisoning people for a non-problem.”
