policing cannabis as a class c drug - jrf...and inspector philip painter who kindly explained the...

Policing cannabis as a Class C drug

An arresting change?

Tiggey May, Martin Duffy, Hamish Warburton and Mike Hough

A review of the impact of reclassification on the policing of cannabis possession.

In January 2004, cannabis was reclassified from a Class B to a Class C drug. This report, by theInstitute for Criminal Policy Research at King’s College London, describes the impact ofreclassification on the policing of cannabis possession. To date, little research has been carriedout in this area and there is a lack of knowledge about how reclassification has affected policingpractice.

The study describes how the legislative changes and associated guidelines have been put intopractice and provides a snapshot view of the impact of these changes. It describes the newprocedures and documents current practice in relation to arrests for ‘aggravated possession’and warnings issued on the street (particularly for repeat offenders). The report also assessesthe impact on police resources, explores police views about the changes and examines youngpeople’s knowledge and attitudes about the changes.

The authors conclude that if cannabis policing is to be seen as equitable and fair and thecriminal justice system as open and transparent, the policing of cannabis needs to be non-discriminatory, adequately monitored and critically evaluated at regular intervals.

Policing cannabis as a Class C drug will be of interest to politicians, police managers, central andlocal government officials, drug workers, academics and drug researchers.

This publication can be provided in alternative formats, suchas large print, Braille, audiotape and on disk. Please contact:Communications Department, Joseph Rowntree Foundation,The Homestead, 40 Water End, York YO30 6WP.Tel: 01904 615905. Email: [email protected]

Also available in this series

The Report of the Independent Working Group on Drug Consumption Rooms

Independent Working Group on Drug Consumption Rooms

Occasional and controlled heroin use: Not a problem?

Hamish Warburton, Paul J. Turnbull and Mike Hough

Understanding drug selling in communities: Insider or outsider trading?

Tiggey May, Martin Duffy, Bradley Few and Mike Hough

Temperance: Its history and impact on current and future alcohol policy

Virginia Berridge

Drugs in the family: The impact on parents and siblings

Marina Barnard

Underage ‘risky’ drinking: Motivations and outcomes

Lester Coleman and Suzanne Cater

Parental drug and alcohol misuse: Resilience and transition among young people

Angus Bancroft, Sarah Wilson, Sarah Cunningham-Burley, Kathryn Backett-Milburn and Hugh Masters

Policing cannabis as a Class CdrugAn arresting change?

Tiggey May, Martin Duffy, Hamish Warburton and Mike Hough

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has supported this project as part of its programme of researchand innovative development projects, which it hopes will be of value to policy makers, practitionersand service users. The facts presented and views expressed in this report are, however, those of theauthors and not necessarily those of the Foundation.

Joseph Rowntree FoundationThe Homestead40 Water EndYork YO30 6WPWebsite: www.jrf.org.uk

© ICPR, School of Law, King’s College, London 2007

First published 2007 by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation

All rights reserved. Reproduction of this report by photocopying or electronic means for non-commercial purposes is permitted. Otherwise, no part of this report may be reproduced, adapted,stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, orotherwise without the prior written permission of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

ISBN 978 1 85935 543 5 (paperback)ISBN 978 1 85935 544 2 (pdf: available at www.jrf.org.uk)

A CIP catalogue record for this report is available from the British Library.

Cover design by Adkins Design.

Prepared and printed by:York Publishing Services Ltd64 Hallfield RoadLayerthorpeYork YO31 7ZQTel: 01904 430033; Fax: 01904 430868; Website: www.yps-publishing.co.uk

Further copies of this report, or any other JRF publication, can be obtained either from the JRF website(www.jrf.org.uk/bookshop/) or from our distributor, York Publishing Services Ltd, at the above address.

Contents

Acknowledgements vi

Summary vii

1 Introduction 1Cannabis use in England and Wales 1Enforcing the law: the national picture 2Policing cannabis as a Class B drug 2The journey from Class B to Class C 3Policing cannabis possession: ACPO guidance 2003 5The possibility of a return to Class B 5Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 6Policing cannabis possession: ACPO draft guidance 2006 7Aims and methods of the study 9Structure of the report 11

2 Support for and understanding of reclassification 12The general population internet sample 12Young people 14Do the police support reclassification? 16Police perceptions and understanding of ACPO and force guidance 17Police encounters with the public for cannabis possession offences 19

3 The policing of possession offences 21Enforcing the law: the local picture 21Deciding whether to arrest or street warn 25Street warnings 30Disposing of a cannabis offence informally 33Policing young people 35

4 The consequences of reclassification 38Has reclassification saved resources? 38Policing cannabis as a Class C drug: some unintended consequences 40

5 Discussion and conclusions 44The value of street warnings 45Policing young people caught in possession of cannabis 45Recording and monitoring street warnings 47An effective communications strategy 49The impact of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 50The future 50

Notes 51

References 53

Without the generosity and support of ourfunders, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, thisstudy would not have been possible, and we areparticularly grateful to them. The viewsexpressed in this report are, however, those ofthe authors and not necessarily those of theFoundation.

Studies of this nature can only be madepossible through the dedication andcommitment of many people. To preserve theanonymity of the sites, and to protect theidentities of our respondents, we have notthanked by name the many people who gave uptheir time, provided us with important insightsinto their work and helped us in numerousother ways during the lifetime of the project. Weare, nevertheless, very grateful to them all.

We would like to thank Rudi Fortson forguiding us through some of the intricacies of theSerious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005and Inspector Philip Painter who kindlyexplained the approach to policing cannabis inhis force. Our thanks are also due to the

Association of Chief Police Officers DrugsCommittee Standing Working Group, who wereparticularly helpful throughout the lifetime ofthis project. We would also like to express ourgratitude to Magda Boutros for her assistancewith data collection and to Siân Turner from theInstitute for Criminal Policy Research for heradministrative support.

We are also grateful for the advice andsupport provided by our advisory group: BenBowling, Kevin Green, Ruth Runciman, JeremySare and Sebastian Saville. Thanks are also dueto Charlie Lloyd, Marguerite Owen and otherstaff at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation fortheir help and support throughout the project’slifetime.

Finally, we would like to extend a specialthanks to all the police officers who allowed usto observe them, and who discussed their viewsand work with candour, patience and a greatdeal of humour; and to the young people whogave up their spare time to be interviewed.

Acknowledgements

vi

This report presents the findings of a studyexamining how the policing of cannabis wasaffected by the reclassification of cannabis froma Class B to Class C drug. Drug reformers hadoriginally proposed that cannabis should bereclassified partly because it was a drug thatposed lower risks than others in the categoryand partly because this would mean that thepossession of cannabis would no longer be anarrestable offence. This removal of police arrestpowers would have made reclassification one ofthe most significant changes to the drug lawssince the introduction of the Misuse of DrugsAct 1971.

In fact the road to reclassification was a longand tortuous one. The then Home Secretary,David Blunkett, first announced that he wasconsidering the change in 2001. After muchdebate he announced he would reclassify thedrug but retain the powers of arrest forpossession offences, and this took effect inJanuary 2004. However, in parallel, theAssociation of Chief Police Officers (ACPO)issued to forces guidance that stated that thosefound in possession of cannabis should be givenstreet warnings and have the drug confiscated.Only flagrant offences were expected to result inarrest. The study is concerned largely with theimpact of this guidance – which, ironically,could have been introduced even if cannabishad been left as a Class B drug.

In carrying out this study we broadlyreplicated a study of cannabis policing that wemounted for the Joseph Rowntree Foundationbefore reclassification was under consideration.The first study involved detailed case studies infour basic command units (BCUs). In the currentstudy we returned to the same sites, where weobserved patrol officers at work, interviewed

officers and young people, and analysedcustody records and street warning statistics.We also mounted an internet survey on people’sknowledge about, and attitudes towards, thecannabis laws.

Cannabis use and enforcement

Over the last 40 years the public’s attitudetowards cannabis has become far more relaxedand use of the drug far more widespread. TheBritish Crime Survey shows that nine-and-ahalf-million people aged between 16 and 59have ever tried cannabis, a figure that hasincreased year by year since the introduction ofthe survey in 1981. Since the introduction of theMisuse of Drugs Act 1971, the number of peoplecoming into contact with the police for offencesof cannabis possession has also increased. Thenumber of people cautioned or convicted forpossessing cannabis peaked in 1998 at 84,310.The next four years saw the number of formalpolice contacts for a possession offence decline.Coinciding with the announcement in 2002 thatconsideration was to be given to reclassifyingcannabis, formal police action again started torise. In the first year of policing cannabis as aClass C drug (2004), arrests dropped to justunder 50,000 and, while street warning datawere unavailable for the first three months of2004, in the last nine the police issued 27,520street warnings.

Support for and understanding of

reclassification

Among our sample of internet respondents andyoung people there was widespread support forthe reclassification of cannabis. The vast

Summary

vii


majority of internet respondents were alsoopposed to a possession offence forming part ofa person’s criminal record, and consideredarresting and processing simple cannabispossession offences a waste of police time andresources. The clear indication from the internetsample was that the Government was right toreclassify and that their preference was thatcannabis policing should be handled with amuch lighter touch than before.

While support for reclassification waswidespread, understanding was far lesscomprehensive. Nearly all respondents wereaware of the key facts: that cannabis had beenreclassified; that it was still illegal; and thatstreet warnings were just one of the ways thatpolice officers could deal with possessionoffences. However, few respondents wereparticularly well informed about any of thesubtleties of the changes that had taken place.Neither internet users nor young people tendedto know that those under 18 had to be dealtwith differently to adults, being ineligible forstreet warnings. Many also wrongly thoughtthat officers were permitted to dispose ofcannabis informally without recording the fact.

Police support for reclassification was lessenthusiastic than that of the internet sample oryoung people. Almost three-fifths (n = 150)believed the Government was wrong toreclassify cannabis. Many viewed cannabis as a‘gateway’ or ‘stepping stone’ to the use of othermore harmful drugs, such as heroin and crack,and believed that reclassification would increasethe incidence of young people trying suchsubstances. Some believed that, as the use ofstreet warnings substituted for arrest, therewould be a fall in detections for more seriousoffences, which emerged as a by-product of

arrests for cannabis possession. Other officersopposed reclassification because of theconfusion they believed it had caused both thepublic and other serving police officers.Unsurprisingly, there was almost universal (93per cent) support for retaining the power ofarrest. Although a majority of officers opposedreclassification, less than half wanted to see theGovernment reverse its decision and reclassifyback to a Class B. Officers who supportedreclassification and believed the Governmentwas right to reclassify highlighted theintroduction of the street warning asparticularly useful.

Officers in our busy urban sites had a betterunderstanding than those working in thequieter areas, who encountered cannabis lessoften. Under half our sample of officersremembered reading the ACPO guidelines –despite the considerable efforts that ACPO hadtaken to inform people. Some officers stated thatreclassification had created a ‘grey’ area aboutwhen to arrest and when to issue a streetwarning, and nearly all disclosed that they haddealt with a member of the public who believed– or claimed to believe – that cannabis had beenlegalised.

Policing possession offences

Across the four sites the overall number ofpeople coming into contact with the police for acannabis possession offence increased from 2000to 2004/05. Local arrangements for dealing withpossession offences did, however, tend to vary.Policing in Site 1 was tailored to the problems ofthe area, in particular the presence of two highlyvisible, street-based cannabis markets. Theyfollowed a policy of arresting for possession

viii

Summary

offences, with a view to disrupting the markets,and rarely used street warnings. The other threesites had – to a greater or lesser degree –substituted street warnings for both cautionsand charges.

In Site 1 police stops and searches yieldedthe greatest proportion of cannabis possessionoffences. Officers from the other three areaswere more likely to discover cannabis followingan arrest for another offence. In all four areas wefound evidence to suggest that there wereofficers who clearly specialised in policingcannabis possession offences. In 2004/05, 9 percent of officers were responsible for 25 per centof all simple possession arrests. Analysis of30,000 custody records revealed that less than 1per cent of simple possession arrests ‘openedthe door’ to the discovery of other more seriousoffences, calling into question the widespreadpolice view that cannabis arrests frequently leadto the detection of more serious offences.

Deciding on whether to arrest or issue astreet warning was rarely guided by the rulebook alone and was frequently influenced bymore than one factor. Important factors were:the amount of cannabis found, a person’soffending history, the age of the offender, thelocation of the offence and the attitude of theoffender. Officers still faced dilemmas aboutdisposing of possession offences informally.Some officers said they continued to do so.Others said that they were less likely to dealwith offences informally now that streetwarnings were available to them. We do nothave any evidence to say whether, overall,informal disposals have risen or fallen.

Many officers considered it inequitable thatthey were required to arrest those under the ageof 18 for possession offences. The flexible

approach for adults contrasted sharply with therigidity of procedures for young offenders. Lessthan half our sample of officers wanted tocontinue to police young people in this way andsuggested that the status quo was damaging totheir relationship with young people. Mostwanted the freedom to be able to decide on acase-by-case basis whether to issue a streetwarning to a young person, especially thoseaged 16 and 17. Some officers argued thatgreater flexibility in dealing with youngoffenders would yield considerable resourcesavings. There was a general agreement thatthose aged 16 or over should be eligible forstreet warnings, while those under 16 shouldcontinue to be policed in line with theprovisions of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.

The consequences of reclassification

When announcing his intention to reclassifycannabis, David Blunkett, the previous HomeSecretary, offered three key reasons for thechange (Home Office, 2005a):

• a reduction in resources devoted topolicing low-level cannabis possessionoffences

• using these freed-up resources to helpconcentrate on tackling Class A drugproblems

• placing cannabis in a class that reflectedits relative harmfulness.

This report has nothing to say on the issue ofrelative harmfulness, which is territory fordoctors, mental health experts andepidemiologists. However, we can comment onwhether reclassification led to resource savings

ix


across our four areas and about the likelihoodthat these savings were channelled into tacklingClass A drugs.

The rationale for street warnings was thatthey would be both a proportionate responseand a time-saving one. Few police respondentswho had issued a street warning doubted thattime was saved. We have made rough estimatesof the size of the savings – in terms of bothofficer hours and money – accrued across ourfour research sites. Our calculations simplyindicate the order of magnitude of the savingsthat can be made by using street warningsinstead of arrests. During the first year of streetwarnings we estimate that, across our four sites,a total of around £38,000 was saved through theuse of street warnings or around 3,000 officerhours. Nationally, reclassification is likely tohave saved the 43 forces of England and Walesjust over three-and-a-half-million pounds or269,327 officer hours.

The amount of money saved is smaller thanoriginally expected, reflecting the fact thatarrests for possession are still commonplace. Itis questionable whether savings on this scale arebeing redirected to address Class A drugproblems. During our observations we rarelywitnessed any shift operating at their full staffcomplement; and at peak times officersstruggled to react to the demands placed onthem. They only had the chance to engage inproactive work in the early hours of themorning. It is unlikely, therefore, that theresources freed up by substituting arrests withstreet warnings will be used proactively totackle heroin and crack offences. In reality, thesavings are likely to result in officers respondingslightly quicker or slightly better to publicdemand.

Pointers for action

Overall, our study has shown that the practiceof issuing street warnings for offences ofcannabis possession is a viable one, whichcommands support from both the police andpoliced. Our findings suggest ways in whichprocedures need improvement, however.

The first of these relates to monitoring andrecord keeping. It is important to have accurateand consistently maintained records, not leastbecause the decisions to warn may depend onwhether the offender has been previouslywarned. However, good records are also aprerequisite for monitoring policing practice. Inour study, people from black and minority ethicgroups (BME) were over-represented in thestatistics for cannabis possession. The study wasunable to disentangle the factors that wereimplicated in this. However, it demonstrates theimportance of having statistics that will allowforces to monitor which groups are coming topolice attention for possession offences and toidentify whether any groups are more or lesslikely than others to be given street warnings.

The impact of government-set targets on thepolicing of cannabis needs to be kept underreview. In one of our four sites, officers weretrawling for possession offences in order toswell the count of detections required to meetthe Public Service Agreement 3 (PSA3) target forbringing offenders to justice. This practice willdo nothing to improve relations between localpolice and local communities, nor does it meetthe intentions behind the government target.

Arrangements for dealing with youngoffenders found in possession of cannabis needreview. There is in any case some concern aboutthe way in which the arrangements introduced

x

Summary

by the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 can propelyoung people into the youth courts for a rangeof minor offences. The practice of streetwarnings draws into sharp focus the contrastbetween procedures for people aged under 18and those for adults. Many will see it asirrational and unfair for a 17 year old to acquirea criminal record following an arrest and areprimand for possession, while their 18-year-old friend will simply be warned on the street.Even more unfair is the fact that prosecution isinevitable for a 17 year old who has already hada final warning; by contrast, the 18 year oldstands to get a street warning even where he orshe has several previous convictions forunrelated offences.

Our study has documented the extent ofconfusion surrounding the reclassification ofcannabis – among both police and youngpeople. It is unlikely that this confusion willdisappear. We see considerable value in furtherattempts to convey accurately to the public, andin particular to young people, informationabout the legal status of cannabis, as well as thehealth risks it presents. A communicationstrategy needs to ‘segment’ the key audiencesand to tailor methods to each particularaudience.

Ironically, the Serious Organised Crime andPolice Act (SOCaP) 2005 has changed policearrest powers in a way that renders obsoletemuch of the discussion about theinterrelationship between the classification ofcannabis and the powers of arrest for thepossession offence. From January 2006, thedistinction between arrestable and otheroffences has been abolished by SOCaP. Officersmay arrest for any offence, provided that tests ofnecessity are met. It remains to be seen if the

courts interpret the relevant provisions ofSOCaP in a way that tightens or loosens policediscretion in making arrests. If the legality ofpossession arrests is challenged in court, onepossible outcome is that the pressure not toarrest will become more intense. But, equally,the courts could interpret the provisions in apermissive way that extends police discretion.Clearly this is an issue that will repay closeattention.

In conclusion

Overall our findings suggest that thereclassification of cannabis from Class B to ClassC has had a smaller impact than advocates ofthe change hoped and than opponents feared.The final phase of this study was carried outamong considerable uncertainty about thefuture of policing cannabis offences. For a time,it seemed probable that Charles Clarke wouldreverse his predecessor’s originalreclassification and that cannabis would returnto a Class B – if this had been the case itprobably would have triggered an end to thepractice of street warnings for cannabispossession. In the event, cannabis retained itsClass C classification and ACPO retained itsadvice about the disposal of possession offences.The presumption remains that people found inpossession will receive street warnings. Ourown view is that Charles Clarke’s decision wasright and that street warnings remain aproportionate disposal for the offence inquestion. We believe that the new HomeSecretary, John Reid, should leave cannabis as aClass C drug and encourage the police, wherepossible, to issue street (cannabis) warnings forsimple possession. The arguments that

xi


originally supported the policy of streetwarnings as a substitute for arresting offendersremain persuasive. While the policing ofcannabis will probably remain one of thetension points in relations between police and

young people, the new arrangements shouldprove less corrosive than the previous ones.And, even if the savings to police time aresmaller than originally envisaged, they arevaluable nonetheless.

xii

1

This report presents findings of a study thatexamined the impact of policing cannabis as aClass C drug. The study largely replicates ourfirst study of the policing of cannabis as a ClassB drug (May et al., 2002). The Joseph RowntreeFoundation commissioned the present study in2002 after the then Home Secretary, DavidBlunkett, announced his intention to reclassifycannabis to a Class C drug. If reclassificationhad gone ahead without other legislativechange, the power of arrest for possessionoffences would have been removed. This changewould have constituted the most significantchange in drug laws since the introduction ofthe Misuse of Drugs Act in 1971. This did nothappen, however. Reclassification wasaccompanied by legislative changes thateffectively cancelled out what would have beenthe most significant factor – the removal of thepower of arrest. The new arrangements werefinally in place by January 2004.

We had originally expected to start thisstudy in 2003, assuming that reclassificationwould occur and then be effected quickly. Workwas frozen until late 2004, allowing the changestime to bed in. When we eventually startedfieldwork, we found ourselves evaluating theimpact of a minor policy change that had beenintroduced under conditions of such confusionthat very few people understood its realimplications. What originally appeared to be acrossroad in drugs policy turned out to be littlemore than a cul-de-sac.

At one level, therefore, our findings might beregarded as being of descriptive interest only.But, at the same time, the study hasconsiderable relevance to the policing ofcannabis. This is because, on the one hand, thereclassification to Class C actually involved no

change whatsoever to the legal powers of thepolice; on the other hand, more recent changesto the powers of arrest mean that the policehave to justify arrests for any offence, againstspecified and quite narrow criteria. As will beseen, our study can offer some insight into theimplications of this decision process.

Cannabis use in England and Wales

Over the last 40 years, public attitudes towardscannabis use have become increasingly liberal;use has become far more widespread inEngland and Wales. The British Crime Survey(BCS) reported that just under nine-and-a-half-million people aged between 16 and 59 have, atsome point, tried cannabis (Roe and Man, 2006).In the same survey, 40 per cent of 16 to 24 yearolds stated that they had tried cannabis, withover a fifth (21 per cent – or 1.3 million people)reporting having used it in the previous yearand one in seven (13 per cent) in the monthbefore interview.1

Unsurprisingly, use is highest among lateteenagers and young adults (Graham andBowling, 1995; Miller and Plant, 1996; Parker et

al., 1998; Flood-Page et al., 2000; MORI, 2002b,2004; Budd et al., 2005). Cannabis use is not,however, confined just to older teenagers.Younger age groups are also reportingincreasing cannabis use; in England, 12 per centof school pupils between the ages of 11 and 15reported having used cannabis within the lastyear (NCSR/NFER, 2006). Surveys conductedby MORI in 2002b and 2004 also suggest theaverage age for young people trying cannabis is14 (MORI, 2004). The NCSR/NFER survey alsofound that a quarter of 11–15 year olds havebeen offered cannabis. Ogilvie and colleagues

1 Introduction

2


(2005) recently reported that, by the age of 15,two-thirds of young people say they knowwhere to buy cannabis; unsurprisingly a quarterreported that this was at school.

The most recent Offending, Crime andJustice Survey conducted by the Home Officefound that young people aged ten to 25 whowere identified as vulnerable2 were more likelyto use drugs than those not defined as such.Those defined as vulnerable were also morelikely to report having used cannabis (Beckerand Roe, 2005; Budd et al., 2005).

Although the press has consistently voicedconcern that young people’s drug use, and inparticular cannabis use, is on the increase, theBCS shows that, over the last ten years, cannabisuse has in fact remained fairly constant. Use‘last year’ among 16–24 year olds graduallyincreased during the 1990s, peaking in 1998 (28per cent) and declining since then to 21 per cent(Roe and Man, 2006).

Enforcing the law: the national picture

In 1994, 61,690 people were cautioned orconvicted for a cannabis possession offence.This figure rose throughout the 1990s untilpossession offences coming to the attention ofthe police peaked in 1998 at 84,310. After 1998,numbers fell steadily until 2002 when the thenHome Secretary, David Blunkett, announced hisintention to reclassify. In 2000, those foundguilty or cautioned had fallen to 65,750.However, by 2002, this figure had risen to74,040; rising again in 2003 to 77,500. In the yearafter reclassification took effect in January 2004,the number of possession offences dealt with inthis way dropped to 45,490. From April 2004 till

December 2004, when information on streetwarnings started to be collected centrally, therewere 27,520 street warnings issued by thepolice, bringing the number of people cominginto contact with the police or courts for acannabis possession offence to 73,010,representing a decline of 4,490 offenders fromthe previous year.3 Figure 1 highlights the trendin cannabis cautions and convictions forpossession offences set against the trend datafor cautions and convictions for all other drugs.

Policing cannabis as a Class B drug

Our original study of the policing of cannabisinvolved analysis of national and local statistics,and in-depth case studies in two police forceareas (May et al., 2002). It found the following.

• Almost half of the offences of simplepossession involved first-time offenders.

• Possession offences most often came to lightas a by-product of other investigations.

• Arrests for possession very rarely led to thediscovery of serious crimes.

• There was a large variation in cautioningrates across forces.

• A minority of patrol officers ‘specialised’ incannabis offences.

• Officers often turned a blind eye topossession offences or gave informalwarnings.

• Arrests consumed substantial amounts ofpolice time – one arrest typically removedtwo officers from the streets for half a shift.

3

Introduction

• The financial costs of policing cannabisamounted to at least £50 million a year andabsorbed the equivalent of 500 full-timepolice officers.

• Many officers thought the cannabislegislation needed updating. Nearly a thirdbelieved cannabis should be decriminalised.Only 9 per cent favoured reclassification.

The journey from Class B to Class C

The cannabis laws have been a contentious issuein Britain for at least 40 years. The Governmentgave serious consideration in 1970 to makingthe offence of possession punishable only by afine, but opted for a tougher approach in theface of an upcoming election (cf. Warburton et

al., 2005). Despite an undertow of dissent, theMisuse of Drugs Act 1971 and its variousschedules remained largely unchanged untilrecently. Pressure for reform built up in the1990s as the public became increasingly tolerant

of cannabis use (Newcombe, 1999; Guardian,2001; ICM, 2001; Pearson and Shiner, 2002).

One significant trigger for change was theIndependent Inquiry into the Misuse of DrugsAct 1971 (Police Foundation, 2000). The reportrecommended that cannabis should bereclassified from Class B to Class C, partly inrecognition of the fact that cannabis posed fewerhealth risks than other Class B drugs and partlybecause it would make possession of cannabis anon-arrestable offence (Police Foundation,2000).4 It was envisaged that this change wouldremove a considerable source of frictionbetween the police and cannabis smokers, andwould avoid the criminalisation of largenumbers of young people. However, when thereport was published, the Government wasquick to dismiss it.

Perhaps as a reaction to the outright rejectionby the Government, the media gave the Inquirya warm welcome and conservative newspapersthat had traditionally taken a hard line on drugpolicy began advocating reform. There was a

Figure 1 Trends in cautions and convictions for cannabis and all other drugs in England and Wales between

1994 and 2004

0

10,000

20,000

30,000

40,000

50,000

60,000

70,000

80,000

90,000

1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004

Cannabis

All other drugs

4


sense that the media and public mood oncannabis was changing. In 2001, theParliamentary Home Affairs Committeeannounced that it would conduct its owninquiry into the Government’s drug policy.While giving evidence to the Committee, thethen Home Secretary, David Blunkett,announced that he was consideringreclassifying cannabis to Class C and that hewould be seeking advice from the AdvisoryCouncil on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD).

In the same year the Metropolitan PoliceService (MPS) introduced a pilot, ‘The LambethCannabis Warning Pilot Scheme’, in whichofficers delivered cannabis warnings to thosefound in possession of small amounts ofcannabis. The rationale for the scheme was thatit would free up resources to tackle more seriousClass A drug offences. An internal policeevaluation judged the Lambeth pilot a success(Metropolitan Police Authority, 2002) and anindependent public attitude survey found that italso enjoyed the support of the local community(MORI, 2002a). In the first half of 2002, both theHome Affairs Committee and the ACMDrecommended that cannabis be reclassified(ACMD, 2002; Home Affairs Select Committee,2002).

A government compromise

While there appeared to be considerable will forreform, support for reclassification was far fromuniform within government. Moreover, somewell-placed senior police officers were resistantto the proposition that they would lose theirpower of arrest for possession offences. Coupledwith the disquiet being expressed by somepolice officers and politicians, the mood in themedia was changing. The conservative press,

previously supportive of reform, reversed itsposition and rediscovered its collective taste fora hard prohibitionist line, regularly printingnegative stories about the possibility of cannabisbecoming a Class C drug. For example, thebroadsheet Sunday Times (30 June 2002) led witha story about ministers ‘pressing ahead’ despitepublic concern and at the risk of a backlash,under the misleading headline, ‘Cannabis to be“legalised” within a year’. The tabloid Daily

Mail (12 July 2002) ran a double-page storyunder the headline, ‘Has Blunkett made a hashof it?’. The press also reconstructed the Lambethexperiment as a failure, referring to theoriginator of the pilot as ‘CommanderCrackpot’.

The Government response to the HomeAffairs Committee report was to announce acompromise: Parliament would be asked toreclassify cannabis to a Class C drug, but thepower of arrest would be retained, allowing it tobe used where aggravating factors were present(Home Office, 2002). However, the precisemeans by which these changes would beeffected were not announced until a year later,in July 2003. It was decided that reclassificationwould be preceded by an amendment to thePolice and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) 1984,making possession of a Class C drug anarrestable offence. Thus the Government’scompromise between the arguments for reformand the arguments for the status quo gavesomething to each side, but very little inaggregate to either. Reclassification finally cameinto effect in January 2004,5 after the CriminalJustice Act 2003 had preserved arrest powers forpossession offences.

This contorted process ended up creatingmaximum confusion about what the new

5

Introduction

reform would actually mean to the average manor woman on the Clapham omnibus. Fewpeople – even among the legally literate public –were able to fully understand the complex self-cancelling effects of reclassification and thePACE amendment restoring the power of arrest.

Policing cannabis possession: ACPO

guidance 2003

In preparation for reclassification and theintroduction of street warnings, in September2003, the Association of Chief Police Officers(ACPO) published its first guidance documentto operational officers on simple possessionoffences and the circumstances that wouldwarrant an arrest. The guidance stated that,while the power of arrest was available forsimple possession offences, the presumptionshould be against using this power (ACPO,2003, para. 2.1). An arrest would be consideredappropriate, however, in certain aggravatingcircumstances. In the absence of anyaggravating conditions a street warning shouldbe issued. At the time ACPO issued extensiveguidance on aggravating circumstances, which,as we shall see, was followed to a greater orlesser degree depending on the force, the BCU(basic command unit) and the individual patrolofficer.

Prior to issuing the guidance ACPO went tounprecedented lengths to ensure that it wasclearly written in a ‘user-friendly’ way and thatit was widely disseminated – both to theworkforce and to those who were likely to comeinto contact with the police for possessionoffences. Communications consultants werehired; consultation across forces was exhaustive;the guidelines were tested out in focus groups;

training CD-ROMs were prepared for everypolice station; and police forces were offeredprofessionally designed templates for posters,which they could badge with their own logos, toreach internal and external audiences. Articleswere placed in newspapers and otherpromotional messages, such as drink coasterswith information about the changes, wereproduced. However, as we shall see, themessage clearly reached some audiences betterthan others.

The possibility of a return to Class B

In the run-up to the 2005 Election, the moodabout cannabis hardened further and theGovernment was subject to accusations of‘being soft on drugs’ in reclassifying cannabis,as the following headlines highlight:

Don’t let our dope-friendly politicians dupe usagain(Mail on Sunday, 20 March 2005)

Cannabis use soared as Labour softened the law(Daily Mirror, 2 March 2005)

The then new Home Secretary, CharlesClarke, asked the ACMD to review its adviceabout the health risks posed by cannabis in thelight of new evidence about its association withmental health problems, especially amongyoung users and those using stronger strains ofcannabis.

Much of the evidence about risks of psychosisand schizophrenia had already been taken intoaccount in the ACMD advice originally put to theprevious Home Secretary in 2002. During thereclassification debate in late 2003, Caroline Flint,the then Home Office minister, said:

6


I am afraid to tell the Hon. Gentleman that thescientific evidence does not fit his analysis [thatcannabis is ten to 15 times stronger than in the1970s]. The evidence of our forensic science unitis that the cannabis that it has sampled is notstronger than it was some years ago. Many of thestatements made about the strength of cannabisdo not fit the facts … the Forensic ScienceService suggests that new growing techniques inthe late 1980s and 1990s have led to some newproducts coming on to the market with averagetetrahydrocannabinol levels two or three timesgreater than for other cannabis products.However, in general, the THC content – theparticular content that affects the strength ofcannabis – varies widely, but much of it does notdiffer significantly from the cannabis used yearsago.(Hansard, 29 October 2003, col. 331)

After much media speculation, the ACMDreported back to the Home Secretary andrecommended that cannabis remain a Class Cdrug. In January 2006, Charles Clarkeannounced that cannabis, for the meantime,would remain a Class C drug. In his speech tothe House of Commons he commented:

On cannabis, I have considered very carefully theadvice which I have received from many sources.I am influenced by data on levels of use of thedrug and evidence that cannabis use has fallenamong 16–24 year olds from 28 per cent in 1998to less than 24 per cent last year. The preliminaryassessment is that, contrary to my personalexpectation, reclassification has not led to anincrease in use. Moreover, I accept the view ofthe Advisory Council that further research on themental health implications is needed before anydecision to reclassify is made.

While I shall keep this matter under close reviewin light of the factors which I have mentioned, Ihave decided to accept the Advisory Council’srecommendation, which is supported by thepolice and by most drugs and mental healthcharities to keep the current classification ofcannabis.(Hansard, 19 January 2006, col. 984)

During his speech Charles Clarkecommented that the Government’s originalcommunication strategy had not been as robustas it was first hoped. To remedy this he statedthat the Home Office, the Department of Healthand the Department for Education and Skillshad undertaken a commitment to work inpartnership to ensure that the public, especiallyyoung people, were aware of the law and thepossible health implications of smokingcannabis.

Serious Organised Crime and Police Act

2005

One detail overlooked by many politicians,commentators and the media was the impact ofthe Serious Organised Crime and Police Act2005 on all offences, including cannabispossession (cf. Fortson, 2006). The Act, whichreceived royal assent in the spring of 2005 andcame into effect at the beginning of January2006, revised the framework of arrest and searchpowers previously governed by PACE. Underthe new Act all offences became arrestable butwith a requirement that a constable mustconsider and possibly prove that each arrest isproportionate and necessary against specifiedand quite narrow criteria. The Act states that:

7

Introduction

The power of summary arrest conferred by … isexercisable only if the constable has reasonablegrounds for believing that for any of the reasonsmentioned in subsection (5) it is necessary toarrest the person in question.

The reasons mentioned in subsection (5) are:

1 if a constable is unable to verify the name ofan individual

2 if a constable is unable to verify the addressof an individual

3 if a constable needs to prevent a person:

• causing physical injury to himself orothers

• suffering physical injury

• causing loss or damage to a property

• committing an offence against publicdecency

• causing an unlawful obstruction of thehighway

4 to protect a child or other vulnerable person

5 to allow the prompt and effectiveinvestigation of the offence or the conduct ofthe person in question

6 to prevent the prosecution of the offencebeing hindered by the disappearance of theperson in question.

One reading of the new provisions is thatpolice have greater freedom to arrest offendersas and when they please. However, the questionmust be raised whether someone found inpossession of a small amount of cannabis whoreadily admits the offence and is able to verify

their details to a constable’s satisfaction shouldbe arrested.

Policing cannabis possession: ACPO draft

guidance 2006

With the introduction of the Serious OrganisedCrime and Police Act (SOCaP) the guidanceissued by ACPO in 2003 needed to be updated.The introduction of the Act also provided ACPOwith the opportunity to address problems withthe terminology that had caused confusion inthe original guidance. In the original guidance,if an officer warned an individual for possessionof cannabis, they were, under ACPO guidelines,issuing a ‘street warning’. Unfortunately theterm was not universally adopted and termsderived from other criminal justice disposalsstarted to become more commonplaceincluding: ‘street caution’, ‘formal warning’,6

‘formal street caution’. Confusion overterminology was further compounded by someofficers wrongly assuming that a street warningcould only be issued on the street. In reality itcan be issued anywhere. To avoid furthermisunderstanding the 2006 draft guidelinesstate that the term ‘cannabis warning’ should beused and urge chief officers to review theirstandard operating procedures in light of theamendment.7

The 2006 draft guidelines reaffirm ACPO’soriginal position, stating that, when officers aredealing with a simple cannabis possessionoffence, the preferred disposal option is acannabis warning. Although officers areencouraged to issue cannabis warnings, they arereminded that possession of cannabis is stillillegal and those found in possession can still bearrested if the provisions of SOCaP are

8


followed. As mentioned above, SOCaP requiresan officer to demonstrate that arrests are bothproportionate and necessary. Althoughproportionality and necessity are now theexpected cornerstone(s) of an arresting officer’sdecision-making processes, the guidance issuedto assist officers outlines only where a cannabisarrest may be viewed as necessary and does not(perhaps for simplicity) discuss proportionality.The new guidance suggests that an arrest maybe necessary where:

1 The name and/or address of the suspect isnot known or there are reasonable groundsfor doubting whether a name given is a realname. For example:

• the officer wishes to caution/warn/summons the suspect for the offence.

2 It is necessary to prevent the offendersuffering physical injury or causing injury tosomeone else. For example:

• a person is so intoxicated they are in needof protection or incapable ofunderstanding the warning procedure

• the person is a juvenile and arrest isnecessary to reduce the harm or risksfaced by that individual if intervention isnot taken

• the person is vulnerable because of theirmental health and arrest is necessary toreduce the harm or risks if intervention isnot taken

• a person is smoking cannabis in thecompany or vicinity of other people andarrest is necessary to reduce the harm orrisks faced by any individual ifintervention is not taken

• a locality has been identified through theNational Intelligence Model as one wherethere is fear of public disorder associatedwith the use of cannabis, which cannot beeffectively dealt with by other means,such as where an open drugs (cannabis)market causes harms to communities.

3 It is necessary to protect a child or vulnerableperson from the offender. For example:

• a person is smoking cannabis in thecompany or vicinity of young orvulnerable people and arrest is necessaryto reduce the harm or risks if interventionis not taken.

4 It is necessary to allow the prompt andeffective investigation of the offence. Forexample:

• the amount of cannabis possessed and/orthe person’s behaviour providesreasonable grounds for suspecting thatthere is an intention to supply and whereit is necessary to obtain evidence byquestioning

• the person has previously received twocannabis warnings and the officer wishesto prevent any prosecution of the offencefrom being hindered by thedisappearance of the person

• in the case of a young or vulnerableperson, it is not possible to obtain theservices of an appropriate adultelsewhere than at a police station for thepurposes of issuing a warning undersection 65 of the Crime and Disorder Act1998.

9

Introduction

What does a street warning mean?

Street warnings differ from formal cautions inthat they do not form part of an official criminalrecord, they are not recorded on the PoliceNational Computer and they cannot be cited incourt as evidence of previous offending. Insteadthey are recorded on local intelligence systems.A street warning differs from other on-the-spotwarnings in that it counts as a ‘sanctiondetection’. This means that each street warningis included in each BCU tally of clear-ups – oneof the performance targets for which they areheld accountable. Unlike the previousguidelines issued to officers in 2003, theupdated 2006 (cannabis warnings) guidelinesstress that officers cannot consider issuing awarning if a person has had two previouscannabis warnings. Interestingly, this idea wasdiscussed in great depth during the consultationand drafting process of the 2003 guidelines butwas considered unworkable. In the finaldocument the ‘three strikes’ policy was left outand the decision on when an arrest wasappropriate was left to chief officers and localBCU managers.

Aims and methods of the study

This study has examined how the legislativechanges and associated guidelines for policingcannabis as a Class C drug were put intopractice following reclassification. The aimswere to:

• describe the new procedures and comparethem to their predecessors

• document practice in relation to streetwarnings and arrests for ‘aggravatedpossession’

• assess the savings (or otherwise) in policetime

• assess the impact on totally informalwarnings

• explore police views about the changes

• examine young people’s knowledge andattitudes about the changes.

In carrying out this study we broadlyreplicated the methods of our previous policingcannabis study. We revisited the four siteswithin the two police forces where weconducted our first study. The sites wereoriginally selected to allow us to explore a rangeof policing practices in rural, suburban andinner-city areas among diverse populationgroups. As with our previous study we haveanonymised the four sites to protect theiridentities and the identities of the people whotook part.

Site 1

Site 1 comprises six densely populated wardswithin a large metropolitan city. The area isethnically diverse, and has pockets of bothextreme affluence and extreme deprivation. Site1 attracts large numbers of tourists and non-residents to its shops, markets, cafes, publichouses and nightclubs. It has two well-established, open, street-based cannabis marketsas well as a separate open, street-based Class Amarket. In policing terms, Site 1 is part of a largeand very busy BCU. The BCU has established aproactive police unit, comprising 12 officers; atthe time of fieldwork this unit spent asignificant amount of time in Site 1 trying todisrupt the cannabis and other drug markets.Local BCU policy, responding to the local

10


circumstances, was that, in designated hot-spotareas (including parts of Site 1), officers shouldarrest those in possession of cannabis regardlessof whether they met the ACPO criteria for astreet warning. In non-hot-spot areas, officerswere free to issue street warnings where theydeemed it appropriate.

Site 2

Site 2 is a predominantly suburban area on theedge of a large metropolitan city. It has anethnically diverse population and small pocketsof deprivation. Unlike the other three sites,officers were divided into five response teamsthat worked an eight-hour shift pattern. Like theother sites, though, the officers spent much oftheir time reacting to public demand andtackling paperwork responsibilities. However,unlike the other sites, we did observe a numberof officers engaging in self-generated proactivework. Officers in Site 2 tended to policecannabis possession offences in accordance withthe ACPO guidance.

Site 3

Site 3 is a large inner-city area. It covers theresidential and industrial outskirts of a citycentre. The area, previously a manufacturinghub, had undergone a period of redevelopmentand regeneration. The area is ethnically diverse;just under a quarter (24 per cent) of the residentpopulation were from black and minority ethnic(BME) groups (ONS, 2001). As with our othersites, uniformed response teams were largelyreactive. However, one area did have anadditional sergeant and four police constablesfunded by the ‘New Deal for Communities’initiative.8 These officers operated as a proactiveteam targeting anti-social behaviour, including

drug use and selling. Cannabis was not viewedas a priority in the area and was policed largelyaccording to the ACPO guidance.

Site 4

Site 4 covers an extensive geographical areaencompassing the edge of a large town, threelarge villages and several smaller ones. It is thusless densely populated than our other researchsites; and the population is mainly white.Policing was traditionally organised: uniformedofficers were permanently allocated togeographically defined areas within the district;and there was little specialisation of function.Uniformed officers typically attended incidents,arrested offenders, obtained statements fromtheir own suspects, interviewed and processedthem, and prepared case files for court. Thisprocess had a significant impact on an officer’sability to stay on patrol and react to publicdemand,9 which meant there was little or notime for officers in Site 4 – even on a night shift– to engage in proactive work, such as stop andsearch. In comparison to our other researchsites, it was rare for officers in Site 4 toencounter cannabis possession offences. Thepaucity of encounters for cannabis was, in part,due to the policing environment, but, for thelarger part, was to do with the style of policingin this area. Constantly having to respond toincoming jobs and deal with the resultantpaperwork limited an officer’s capacity toengage in the type of proactive work that oftenuncovers possession offences.

Case study methods

Work in the four case study areas involved:

• observational work with operational policeofficers

11

Introduction

• interviews with 150 police officers

• analysis of custody record and street warningdata during the period May 2004 to April2005

• interviews with 61 young people.

Internet survey

We also conducted an internet survey designedto assess the general public’s understanding ofreclassification. The sample was assembledopportunistically – through advertisementsplaced in internet discussion forums andelsewhere. We do not claim that the findings arefully representative of the general population’sattitudes and knowledge on the topic. Howeverour 749 respondents are probably not toounrepresentative of those with (a) internet

access and (b) an interest in, and experience of,cannabis.

Structure of the report

Chapter 2 examines the support for, andunderstanding of, reclassification among policeofficers, young people and a general populationsample recruited from the internet. Chapter 3looks at the policing of cannabis as a Class Cdrug in four basic command units in England,and examines the impact of street warnings onarrests and informal disposals. Chapter 4reflects on the consequences of reclassificationand assesses whether reclassificationaccomplished what it originally set out toachieve; and, finally, Chapter 5 discusses thepolicy implications of our findings.

12

Cannabis is the most commonly used illegaldrug in England and Wales. Its use can beconsidered widespread. It is therefore importantthat the cannabis-using population have a goodgrasp of what reclassification means and thelikely consequences of being caught inpossession of the drug. Although the HomeOffice spent a considerable amount of moneyadvertising what reclassification meant and theimplications of reclassification, with somemedia reports suggesting that up to £1 millionhad been spent (Daily Telegraph, 19 January2004), it could be argued that its message wasderailed by inaccurate media reporting. Most ofthe population will have derived theirknowledge about reclassification from local andnational newspapers and television reports.Prior to January 2004, the media devoted a largeamount of coverage to the imminentreclassification of cannabis. Much of thiscoverage was misleading and inaccurate. Thefollowing headlines were typical:

Green light to smoke pot(Daily Mail, 12 September 2003)

By the end of January 2004, it will no longer bean arrestable offence to possess cannabis(The Politics Show South, 15 January 2004)

The downgrading of the drug from Class B toClass C means it will be effectively decriminalisedwithin 12 months(Daily Mirror, 10 July 2002)

Cannabis users free from arrest(Daily Telegraph, 31 October 2001)

This chapter examines the support for andperceptions of reclassification among our

general population internet sample, the youngpeople we interviewed and police officers. Inparticular we have looked at how each groupregarded reclassification and the level ofunderstanding each had about the subsequentimplications of the move, specifically thoseaspects that caused the most confusion.

The general population internet sample

To obtain a more detailed picture of the generalpublic’s understanding of reclassification wedesigned a web-based survey for people tocomplete online. Participation in the survey wasanonymous and open to both cannabis and non-cannabis users of any age from England andWales. Respondents were asked questions abouttheir understanding of reclassification, theirattitudes towards the legislative changes, theirexperience of using cannabis and about anypolice contact they had had for a cannabispossession offence. To raise awareness about thestudy, advertisements were placed on internetdiscussion forums and organisations were askedto place links for the study on their websitesand/or to include adverts or promotionalmaterial in their e-newsletters. To attract asrepresentative a sample as possible, weadvertised on a range of websites and with adiverse selection of organisations. It is, however,important to recognise that any samplegenerated in this way will not be arepresentative general population sample, asparticipants recruited via the internet willalmost certainly favour more affluent socialgroups who have direct access to the internet1

and in our case those who also have a particularinterest in cannabis and/or policing.

2 Support for and understanding of

reclassification

13

Support for understanding of reclassification

The survey was ‘live’ for five months –between the end of June and the end ofNovember 2005. In total 749 people successfullycompleted the survey. Just over two-thirds (67per cent) of the sample were male and nearly all(95 per cent) of the respondents were white. Theaverage age of respondents was 33. Themajority of the sample worked full- (71 per cent)or part-time (6 per cent), or were students (12per cent). Almost half owned their own home(49 per cent), rented privately (26 per cent) orlived with their parents (15 per cent). It is likelymany of the sample will have been exposed tovarious forms of media reporting aboutreclassification, which will have provided themwith at least some understanding ofreclassification and its consequences. Evengiven the limitations outlined above, we believethe resulting data provide a useful indication ofpeople’s support, understanding and opinionsof reclassification.

Support for reclassification

Our internet survey (n = 749) clearly supportedthe Government’s decision to reclassifycannabis. Just over three-quarters ofrespondents (77 per cent) believed theGovernment was correct to reclassify cannabis.The ‘live’ period of the internet surveycoincided with much of the debate aboutwhether the Government should reverse itsdecision and reclassify cannabis back to a ClassB drug. We asked respondents if they wouldsupport a reversal. Seventy-nine per cent wereopposed to the idea of cannabis returning to aClass B drug. Even more (88 per cent) believedthat cannabis possession offences should notlead to a criminal record. Almost nine-tenths ofthe sample also stated that arresting cannabis

offenders is a waste of police resources in some(47 per cent) or all cases (41 per cent). Obviouslyour sample reflects the views of that subset ofthe general public who are interested incannabis policy and who have internet access –an unrepresentative group.

Did respondents understand reclassification?

We asked the internet respondents a number ofquestions that related to their knowledge ofreclassification. Most respondents (92 per cent)were aware that cannabis had beendowngraded to a Class C drug and thatpossession of the drug remained illegal (98 percent). Just over three-quarters (78 per cent) ofthe sample were fairly or very confident thatthey understood reclassification.Unsurprisingly, those in the sample who hadnever used or had not used cannabis for sometime displayed lower levels of confidence thatthey understood reclassification than regularusers. More surprisingly, perhaps, was that,when we analysed the answers from the threegroups separately, we found that regular usersand pro-reformers had only a marginally betterknowledge of the change than those with norecent experience of cannabis use.

As part of the survey we wanted to assess ifpeople understood the implications of beingcaught with the drug. We asked our sample ofinternet users what the police were able to do ifthey encountered an adult in possession of asmall amount of cannabis. Just over two-thirds(67 per cent) correctly indicated that anindividual found in possession of cannabiscould be arrested. Seventy-four per cent of thesample also highlighted that street warningscould be issued. Just over a quarter (29 percent), however, incorrectly believed that an

14


officer was legitimately able to ‘put the cannabisdown the drain’ or ignore the offencecompletely. Just over half (56 per cent) thesample were aware that, in accordance with theCrime and Disorder Act 1998, police officers stillhave a duty to arrest under 18s (juveniles).Interestingly, our sample of under 18s (n = 37)were proportionately more aware of this factthan adults.

Judging by the answers to any singlequestion about the current arrangements, oursample of internet users appears relatively wellinformed. However, many respondents wereright about some things and wrong aboutothers, and the proportion who we judged to befully informed was low. In assessingrespondents’ knowledge about reclassificationwe focused on the three facts that wererepeatedly highlighted in the Government’sadvertising campaign.

• Possession of cannabis is illegal.

• Police officers have the power to arrest forcannabis possession.

• Young people are not eligible for streetwarnings and will be arrested.

Only 32 per cent of our sample was able toidentify the possible outcomes for both adultsand young people found in possession. Theremainder (68 per cent) produced either apartial (39 per cent) or limited (29 per cent)understanding of these facts. While there werefew differences between the age groups, malerespondents possessed a greater understandingof the subtleties of reclassification than females.Thirty-six per cent of females were classified ashaving a limited understanding, compared to 25per cent of males. It is unsurprising to find a

gender disparity, given that more males reportthat they use cannabis (Roe and Man, 2006); anda significantly greater number of males arearrested for a cannabis possession offence(Mwenda, 2005).

In summary, while our overall surveypopulation – as we expected – possessed areasonable working knowledge of the newarrangements, only a minority understood thefull implications for both adults and youngpeople, and a relatively high percentage thoughtthat turning a ‘blind eye’ to the offence was alegitimate judicial disposal. These findings, whilenot conclusive, demonstrate that even those withunlimited access to information via the internetare somewhat confused by what changes wereintroduced by the Government in January 2004and how the changes affect different age groups.

Young people

Since the decision to reclassify was made,concern has repeatedly been expressed about thelevel of understanding young people possess.Although the Government launched a number ofcampaigns, all of which reiterated the illegality ofcannabis and the situation for young people,there has remained a level of uncertainty aboutwhether the Government’s message has beenfully understood by young people. In light ofthis, we were keen to assess the depth ofunderstanding that young people, who eitherused cannabis or had been stopped by the policeon suspicion of carrying drugs, had aboutreclassification. We interviewed 61 young peopleaged between 14 and 21 from our four case-studyareas. All were purposively selected to fit one oftwo criteria: that they had either used cannabis orbeen stopped and searched for drugs in the 12

15


months prior to interview. During the interviewwe asked them about their cannabis use, anyinvolvement they had had with the policeconcerning cannabis, their knowledge about theimplications of reclassification and their viewsabout cannabis policing.

Do young people support reclassification?

As we shall see later, while not all our sample ofyoung people fully understood the subtlenuances of reclassification, most possessedenough information to judge whether theysupported the decision to reclassify or not. Justover two-thirds (42) thought reclassifyingcannabis to a Class C drug was a good idea, justunder a sixth (10) opposed the decision and theremaining nine were either undecided orunaware that cannabis had actually beenreclassified. However, when asked whethercannabis should be legalised, our young peoplewere far more divided. Just over half (33)wanted cannabis to be legalised, while justunder half preferred it to remain illegal. Twoyoung people were undecided on the issue.

Further analysis highlighted two interestingpoints. First, while two-thirds of young malesagreed with the notion of legalising cannabis,just under three-quarters of young females wereeither undecided or thought legalising shouldnot be embarked on. Second, young peoplefrom Sites 1 and 3, where the open, street-basedcannabis markets could be found, were far moresupportive of both reclassification and cannabispossession becoming legal than theircounterparts from the other two areas.

Do young people understand reclassification?

Although a third of the sample was unable tocorrectly identify which class of drug cannabis

fell in, just over two-thirds (42) were aware thatsome sort of change had taken place. However,when we asked about the detail of what hadchanged, like our internet sample, a slightlydifferent picture emerged. We asked allrespondents what options were available to thepolice when they came across an adult inpossession of cannabis. Most (53) were awarethat the police could still arrest and just overhalf were aware that the police were able toissue a street warning. However, over a third(24) incorrectly believed that officers were nowallowed to dispose of the offence informally.During the reclassification process one of theGovernment’s key concerns was to ensure thatyoung people were aware that, for them,nothing had changed and that they would stillbe arrested if found in possession of cannabis.Over half the sample (32) was unaware thatadults and young people (under 18s) weretreated differently. Once informed of this fact,just under two-thirds (39) felt there was noreason why they should be treated differentlyfrom those aged 18 or over. However,understanding on this issue differed betweensites. Young people from Site 1, the busy inner-city area, expressed a better understanding ofthis detail of reclassification than young peoplefrom the quieter, more suburban area of Site 4.The likely explanation for this is that youngpeople from Site 1 – the busy metropolitan area– lived in a policing division that operated apositive arrest policy for cannabis possessionbut also had two ‘open’ street-based cannabismarkets, which increased their likelihood ofeither being offered cannabis or being stoppedand searched for cannabis.

The lack of understanding among youngpeople was also highlighted in an evaluation of

16


the Government’s media campaign conductedby LVQ Research (2004). The evaluationinvolved asking a representative sample of 623young people aged 14–17 about theirunderstanding of reclassification prior to andpost the Government’s awareness campaign.Prior to disseminating any educational leafletsor airing any radio adverts the evaluationrevealed that 88 per cent of the sample wasaware that cannabis was illegal. After an intenseperiod of radio advertising and leafletdissemination this figure rose to 93 per cent ofrespondents. However, much like our sample ofyoung people, when asked about the subtletiesof the changes, the number possessing a goodknowledge reduced dramatically. Prior to thecampaign, only 24 per cent of the sample wasaware that under 18s remained unaffected bythe changes made to the cannabis legislation.Interestingly, after the campaign, the proportionreduced further to 22 per cent, perhapssuggesting that the campaign had caused moreconfusion than clarity. Worryingly, afterlistening to the adverts and reading the leaflets,over a third of respondents believed the policewere able to issue informal warnings or turn ablind eye to the offence. Finally, the number ofrespondents who stated they were confidentthat they knew about the intricacies of the newarrangements dropped after the Government’scampaign.

Several factors may explain why our sampleof young people was confused about theimplications of reclassification. Few had regularaccess to the internet and were thereforeunlikely to access FRANK, the Government’sdrugs education site. Most were unlikely tocome into contact with other methods employedby the Government to advertise its message,

and a small proportion had limited readingabilities and would have had difficulty readingthe promotional material. Young people’s directexperience of being dealt with by the police forcannabis offences could provide anotherpossible explanation for their confusion. In oursample, 17 young people had been found inpossession of cannabis by a police officer. Ofthese, nine had been dealt with informally anddescribed incidents where their cannabis hadbeen confiscated but they had not been arrested.Finally, there will also be some young peoplewho received the correct information but overtime forgot what they were told or only partiallyremembered it.

The inaccurate and contradictory views putforward by our sample of young people suggestthat, despite the scale of the Government’scommunication strategy, it failed to reach thosewho stood to benefit the most from knowingand understanding how the new measureswould affect them.

Do the police support reclassification?

Police officers have to understand, interpret andenforce the laws of this country. Muchlegislative change affects the work of only aminority of police officers. The same cannot besaid about the new arrangements for policingcannabis. For reclassification and the ACPOguidance to work as intended, police support –on the ground – is vital. We examined whetherour sample of police officers felt theGovernment was right to reclassify cannabis toa Class C drug and to remove the requirementto arrest in all cases. While the internet sampletended to see the issue as a black-and-white one,our sample of 150 police officers tended to have

17


more nuanced views. Often, for example, theyfelt that some elements of reclassification weregood and some were bad. Fifty-nine per cent (n= 150) of officers believed the Government waswrong to reclassify cannabis to Class C. Thethree most common reasons put forward byofficers opposed to the decision were: cannabisacts as a ‘gateway’ or ‘stepping stone’ to the useof harder drugs such as heroin and crack;cannabis possession arrests often lead to thedetection of other more serious offences; andreclassification had caused widespreadconfusion. Unsurprisingly, the majority (93 percent) agreed with retaining a power of arrest forthe offence. Although slightly more than half ofour sample of officers disagreed with thedecision to reclassify, when they were asked ifthey thought the Government should revertback to a Class B drug, 44 per cent wereopposed to it and a further 10 per cent wereundecided. Although officers have always hadthe discretion to issue an on-the-spot warningfor a minor offence, such as cannabispossession, support for reclassification wasoften expressed by officers stating that theyappreciated having the ‘new’ additionaldisposal option (street warning), as thefollowing quotes illustrate:

It’s good being able to issue a street warning, asit can be dealt with in minutes – arrestingconsumes a lot of time when you could be outsolving other crimes.

It [moving cannabis back to Class B] would putofficers under an immense workload who alreadyhave an immense workload. Most cannabis usersaren’t committing crime to fund their use.Therefore it’s useful not to have to arrest them.

Police perceptions and understanding of

ACPO and force guidance

Since reclassification, much has been madeabout the confusion it caused, especially amongyoung people. However, little attention has beenpaid to the level of understanding ofoperational officers. An officer coming across acannabis possession offence is not a rarity; as wementioned earlier, one in six of those cautionedor convicted in 1999 were processed for acannabis possession offence. Both use ofcannabis and the regularity with which officersencounter possession offences have increasedsince the introduction of the Misuse of DrugsAct 1971. However, even given the regularitywith which officers are likely to come acrosscannabis, a good working knowledge about thenew procedures was rarer than we hadexpected. Across our four sites some officerswere obviously unsure about the newarrangements for dealing with the offence, asthe following quote illustrates:

I’ve just taken my sergeant’s exam and I don’tknow the law around reclassification properly.You’ve got Home Office policy, ACPO policy,[name of force] policy and [name of district]policy. I wouldn’t know what to do properly if I didcome across the offence. Your colleague just toldme that all under 18s should be arrested – I didn’tknow that.

Others, however, possessed a clearunderstanding of the new arrangements. Onesuch officer explained his understanding ofreclassification as:

Although cannabis has been downgraded to aClass C drug it is still an arrestable offence undera number of criteria: the age of the offender, the

18


quantity, where the offence takes place and thenumber of previous convictions.

It should not be a surprise that the level ofunderstanding among officers is variable.Officers are far more likely to be au fait withlegislation and laws they work with on a regularbasis. Rarely encountering cannabis offenceswill mean that the guidance issued by eithertheir own force or ACPO will have lessrelevance to their everyday practice and istherefore less likely to be learnt or remembered.

In Site 4, the lack of clarity among some ofthe officers became apparent to their shiftsupervisor when we informally discussed thenew cannabis legislation during our first night’sobservation. At the beginning of our secondobservation, the shift sergeant felt it wasnecessary to read the force policy on handlingcannabis possession offences to clear up anyambiguities that existed among the team. Indoing so he informed the officers that the forcepolicy replicated the ACPO guidance onpolicing the offence.

In Site 1, where a positive arrest policyexisted for cannabis possession offences, officershad a much better understanding of the newarrangements. Officers were generally aware ofthe guidance that had been issued by ACPO butwere also aware that their own BCU had its ownpolicy for policing cannabis, which incorporateda positive arrest policy for particular drug andcrime hot spots. During our observation periodin this site, senior police managers reviewedtheir enforcement policy towards cannabispossession offences and issued further guidancereminding officers that a street warning was asuitable disposal option in certain areas of theBCU but not others. Officers were also issued

with a flow diagram to explain when a streetwarning would be appropriate. To furtherencourage officers to use this option, the seniorcommand team also designed a street warningpro forma to assist with the recording of theoffence. This pro forma had the added benefit ofensuring that all street warnings were alsoincluded in the count of sanction detections.

It will be remembered from Chapter 1 thatACPO took a great deal of trouble to make theguidance comprehensible and to ensure that itwas communicated throughout the workforce.We asked operational officers if they had readthe guidance – just under half (48 per cent) ofour sample stated that they had. Some, ofcourse, will have read the advice withoutrealising that it had derived from ACPO.Leaving this aside, of those that had read theguidance, over half (n = 72) gave positivefeedback about it; just under two-fifths (28)described it as ‘useful’; and a further 15 statedthat they had found it ‘informative’. However,just under a third (23) of those who had read theguidance described it negatively. Sixteen officersbelieved it was ‘confusing’ and seven describedit as simply ‘not useful’. The main criticism wasthat the guidance increased the ambiguityassociated with policing the offence and that thestreet warning eligibility criteria were notpractical for front-line policing. However, of the23 officers who were negative about theusefulness of the advice, 13 went on to providea particularly comprehensive explanation of theguidelines.

Just under three-fifths of officers (59 percent) stated that they had received advice fromtheir force about how to deal with a cannabispossession offence. For some this advice hadbeen structured and had taken the form of a

19


training day; for others the advice had beenmore informal and included guidance from linemanagers, email information or informationprovided at a team briefing. Additionally, thoseofficers who were still in their probationaryperiod and those who had just completed theirtraining stated that the reclassification ofcannabis and the associated new arrangementshad been covered either by their tutor or whiletraining.

Police encounters with the public for

cannabis possession offences

We asked our sample of officers (n = 150)whether the new arrangements for dealing withcannabis possession offences had caused themany problems. Two particular areas emerged asproblematic. First, they indicated thatreclassification had created a ‘grey area’ aboutwhen to arrest and when to issue a streetwarning. For many, the guidance was confusingand concern was expressed that, followingreclassification, the message from theGovernment was indistinct. Officers stated that,when cannabis was Class B, they knew it wasarrestable. Now that it was a Class C drug themessage was that the presumption was to issuea street warning, but the power of arrest wasstill there and cannabis was still illegal. Formany, the situation relating to arrests hadbecome confusing:

I think they’ve made a mistake. They’ve made itunclear to people about the status of the drug.They’ve made it too grey. It is either legal or illegal.

Again, with it being a Class B drug, there will beno grey area – it will always be an arrestableoffence.

It was clear before and people understood it wasillegal. Now PCs deal with it in different ways andit doesn’t work.

The second concern expressed by officerswas the problem that reclassification had causedin their encounters with the public. The majority(93 per cent) of officers indicated that, sinceJanuary 2004, they had had to deal withmembers of the public who believed – orclaimed to believe – that cannabis had beenlegalised. Of these, just under a third (33 percent) of officers stated that such situations hadcreated problems for them. When asked toelaborate, officers commented that some ofthose they encountered had been confusedabout the status of cannabis and had believedthat possession of cannabis was legal, thatcannabis use was allowed in a public place orthat possession of cannabis was no longer anarrestable offence. A number of officersindicated that these problems had, in somecircumstances, caused members of the public toaccuse officers of ‘targeting’ them for nolegitimate reason. Officers commented that thishad led to some encounters beingargumentative and antagonistic, as thefollowing quotes highlight:

Now people argue the point that it is legal. ThisGovernment have trivialised it. Now I find I’marresting for public order and the drugs as they’regetting pissed off.

People are adamant it is now legal and don’tbelieve you when you tell them it is not. [I] just tryto explain that it has been reclassified, notlegalised, and that it is still illegal to possess it.

When we try to arrest people, they don’tunderstand that it is illegal and get upset when

20


you arrest them, especially when they have noprevious.

Bearing in mind that most of our sample ofyoung people (n = 61) and those recruited viathe internet (n = 749) were aware that cannabiswas now a Class C drug, was still illegal andremained an arrestable offence, the regularitywith which police officers reportedencountering members of the public whobelieved that possession of cannabis was legalseemed surprising. Undoubtedly there are somepeople who genuinely believe cannabis is nowlegal. However, it is also likely that some peoplestopped by the police attempt to use theperceived confusion about the legal status ofcannabis as a legitimate defence. Our sense isthat the latter group probably outweigh theformer. This view was endorsed in ourinterviews and during our observations, as theofficers below explained:

They are openly smoking it and their first line tous is that it’s legal. It’s then about working out

whether they’re pulling the wool over your eyesor whether they generally believe it’s legal.

Some people are pretending to think it is legaland are using that as an excuse to possess it.[They] will keep using the same excuse as [they]are often not stopped by the same officer.

Some officers argued that reversing thereclassification decision would remove much ofthe confusion generated in January 2004;everybody would know it was illegal andeverybody would be aware that, if they werefound in possession, they would be arrested(although in reality a warning would still be anoption even if cannabis was a Class B drug). Ofcourse, one could also argue that the oppositemight be the case. A reversal might increaseconfusion among the public and police officersabout the consequences of being caught withthe drug and about which message theGovernment wanted to convey about cannabis.

21

This chapter examines the policing of cannabisas a Class C drug. When it was a Class B drug,the police dealt with those in possession of it inone of two main ways. They either arrested theoffender – followed by prosecution or a caution– or else they dealt with the offender informallyby asking him/her to dispose of the drugimmediately – for example by putting it downthe drain. As was discussed in Chapter 1,reclassification was accompanied by ACPOguidance to the effect that most of those foundto be in possession should receive a streetwarning. In terms of its legal status the streetwarning does not differ from the informal orformal warnings that have long been issued.Police officers have always had the discretion towarn rather than to arrest or summons forminor offences. In administrative terms, thestreet warning has different recordingrequirements to a formal warning. Like a formalwarning, but unlike an informal one, it carriesthe implication that the chances of any futurewarnings are reduced. In the case of a streetwarning, a record is made of the confiscation ofthe drug.1

One of the key research questions addressedby this study is the impact that street warningshave had on the two pre-existing methods ofdealing with possession offences. This chaptercompares the period from May 2004 until April2005 with the period covered in our previousstudy. First we have compared the disposaloptions for a possession offence in 2000 with2004/05 in our four study sites. We then presentour interview and observational findings on thecircumstances that can lead to an arrest, streetwarning or informal disposal.

Enforcing the law: the local picture

At the time of fieldwork, ACPO guidance – andimplicit Home Office policy – was that a simplecannabis possession offence with noaggravating factors should normally result in astreet warning. It remained the responsibility ofeach chief officer to decide how cannabis wouldbe policed at a force level; and BCUcommanders had a degree of delegatedauthority to decide how it should be policed at alocal level. In some areas, local policingpriorities will demand a different approach tothe policing of cannabis than in others.

In our four areas, we examined data onarrests and street warnings to assess the impactreclassification and the ACPO guidance had hadon policing cannabis offences. Overall thenumber of people recorded as coming intocontact with the police increased from 2000 to2004/05. However, case disposals between thesites varied considerably. This was in part areflection of the different policing styles wefound across the four sites. As described above,Site 1 had adopted a positive arrest policytowards cannabis possession offenders. Seniorpolice managers were confronted with twohighly visible, ‘open’, street-based cannabismarkets and had decided that arresting was themost effective and appropriate response to theseunusual circumstances. This explains why streetwarnings were used much less in Site 1 thanelsewhere. The other three sites had – to agreater or lesser degree – substituted streetwarnings for cautioning or charging.

Site 1

In Site 1 the number of people coming intocontact with the police for a cannabis possession

3 The policing of possession offences

22


offence rose slightly from 553 in 2000 to 584 in2004/05. Of these, 22 per cent were issued witha street warning and 78 per cent were arrested,in line with the positive arrest policy. Figure 2shows that street warnings appear to havesubstituted partly for cautions, with thepercentage of charges and other disposalsremaining broadly static between 2000 and2004/05. (We cannot say what accounts for thegrowth in ‘other’ disposals for adults.) Thepattern of disposals clearly reflected the policydecision that arresting offenders was aproportionate response to the particularpolicing problems of the area.In 2000, 159 arrestees were from a black orminority ethnic (BME) background,representing 29 per cent of those arrested forcannabis possession. By 2004/05, thisproportion had risen considerably and, of the584 police contacts for a possession offence, 300(51 per cent) were from a BME background; 284were recorded as white, white European orwhite other. People from BME backgroundsmade up 55 per cent of the arrest population

and 38 per cent of the street-warned population.Officers from Site 1 arrested the greatestproportion (88) of young people across the foursites, reflecting the appeal of the area to youngpeople. A small proportion (six) of youngpeople also received a street warning in thisparticular area. The average (mean) age ofarrestees and those who were street warnedwas 23.

Site 2

In Site 2, the number of people coming intocontact with the police increased slightly from354 in 2000 to 370 in 2004/05. The proportion ofcharges remained largely unchanged. To a muchgreater extent than in Site 1, street warningssubstituted for adult cautions – very much asintended in the ACPO guidance: in 2000 nearlyhalf (45 per cent) of all adult arrestees werecautioned; in 2004/05 the figure dropped to 8per cent, with street warnings accounting for 39per cent of cases. However, the proportion ofcases in which adults were charged actuallygrew slightly, from 23 to 26 per cent.

0 20

2000

2004/05

%40 60 80 100

Street warning

Adult caution

Adult charge

Adult other

Juvenile

Figure 2 Site 1 – inner-city BCU in large metropolitan area

23

The policing of possession offences

In 2004/05, of the 370 people who came intocontact with the police, 63 per cent were fromBME groups, of which 60 per cent were arrestedand 40 per cent received a street warning; 35 percent were white; of these, 65 per cent werearrested and 35 per cent received a streetwarning. The ethnicity of the remaining 2 percent was not recorded. By comparison, BMEarrestees comprised 53 per cent of arrests forcannabis possession in 2000. Site 2 arrested 61young people in the year 2004/05 and streetwarned six. Figure 3 outlines the disposals forpossession offences in 2000 and 2004/05.

Site 3

Site 3 also saw an increase in the number ofpeople coming into contact with the police for acannabis possession offence from 198 in 2000 to246 in 2004/05. Figure 4 shows that, in the year2000, nearly half of those found in possessionwere charged; by 2004/05 this percentage hadmore than halved to 19 per cent. Street warningsin this site appear to have substituted both for

adult cautions and arrests. The proportion ofcases involving formal action against youngpeople dropped from 20 per cent in 2000 to 8per cent in 2004/05 – for reasons that we cannotexplain. We are unaware if there was a hiddensubstitution of street warnings for youngpeople, as officers in Site 3 rarely entered theage of the offender who they street warned ontheir drug database. Of the 102 street warnings,only 12 had an age recorded against theirwarning. Like Site 1, people in Site 3 from BMEbackgrounds disproportionately came intocontact with the police for a cannabis possessionoffence compared to their representation in thelocal population. In 2000, the proportion of BMEcannabis possession arrestees was 37 per cent;by 2004/05 those coming into contact with thepolice for a possession offence had risen to 62per cent. This figure was just over two-and-a-half times greater than their representation inthe local population. Figure 4 outlines thedisposals for possession offences in 2000 and2004/05.

Figure 3 Site 2 – outer-city BCU in large metropolitan area

0 20

2000

2004/05

%40 60 80 100

Street warning

Adult caution

Adult charge

Adult other

Juvenile

24


Site 4

Site 4 was the only site where the number ofpeople coming into contact with the police for acannabis possession offence fell – from 114 in2000 to 70 in 2004/05. Figure 5 shows that streetwarnings seem to have substituted very largelyfor both adult cautions and charges. In 2000, 40per cent of cannabis contacts were charged;however, by 2004/05, this figure had dropped toonly 9 per cent. In 2000 almost a third ofcontacts were cautioned; again by 2004/05 thisfigure had reduced to 6 per cent. The only groupto remain relatively static was young people. In2000 young people comprised 23 per cent ofpolice contacts; in 2004/05 young peopleaccounted for just over a quarter (27 per cent) ofall police arrests. Police in Site 4 also issuedeight young people with a street warning. Outof 114 people coming into contact with thepolice for a possession offence in 2000 only onewas from a BME background. In 2004/05, 21 outof a total of 70 were from BME backgrounds.

Over-representation of black and minority

ethnic offenders

People from BME groups were heavily over-represented among offenders in Sites 1, 3 and 4,and somewhat over-represented in Site 2. Severalprocesses could be interacting to account for this(cf. Clancy et al., 2001), including:

• over-representation of BME residents in high-crime areas where stop-and-search tactics arewidely used

• over-representation of BME groups ascannabis users

• police targeting of BME suspects in suchareas.

It will also be remembered that Site 1included two active open cannabis markets, withsignificant involvement on the part of peoplefrom some BME groups as sellers. It seems likelythat some of the possession cases in the statisticsinvolved sellers found in circumstances wherethe police could establish the offence ofpossession, but not more serious offences ofsupply or possession with intent to supply.

Figure 4 Site 3 – big-city BCU area

0 20

2000

2004/05

%40 60 80 100

Street warning

Adult caution

Adult charge

Adult other

Juvenile

25


This study cannot disentangle the factorsthat might explain this over-representation – butit is clearly important to closely monitor trendsin the disposal of possession offences.Minimally, information systems need to monitornumbers warned and numbers arrested, byethnic group.

Deciding whether to arrest or street warn

Police officers use ‘original powers’ in decidingwhether or not to arrest suspects. That is, theyare accountable primarily to the courts for thelegality of their decision and not to their chiefofficer. Thus force policy, BCU policy and ACPOguidance may frame their decision making, butthey nevertheless have a real decision to make.

Across the four sites in the year period May2004 to April 2005 we analysed just under 1,000custody records that involved a cannabisoffence. Of these, 871 involved a cannabispossession offence. We examined each offence tosee how it came to the attention of the police,how the offence was disposed of, whether therewere concurrent offences and if the cannabis

possession offence was a by-product of anotheroffence or whether it had acted as a lever touncover more serious offences. We did this tounderstand how and in what circumstancescannabis came to the attention of the police and,once they had discovered it, how operationalofficers decided to dispose of the case. For themost part, we have generalised across the foursites; where practice was idiosyncratic, as in Site1, we have drawn attention to this.

Discovering cannabis

Across the four areas, police-initiated stops andsearches were the most common discoveryroute, but there were variations between sites.In Site 1 over half (56 per cent) of all possessionarrests came to light as a result of a police-initiated stop and search; but in Sites 2, 3 and 4 apolice-initiated stop and search yielded only 17,6 and 5 per cent of all arrestees. In each of thesesites cannabis was most commonly discoveredas a by-product of another offence. Table 1outlines how cannabis possession offences cameto the attention of the police across the foursites.

Figure 5 Site 4 – rural BCU area

0 20

2000

2004/05

%40 60 80 100

Street warning

Adult caution

Adult charge

Adult other

Juvenile

26


Simple cannabis possession offences

As we have seen, arrests for cannabis possessionhave continued to be made across the four sitessince January 2004. Unfortunately, custodyrecord data were unable to throw any light onwhether there were aggravating circumstancesthat led to the arrest, or if the offender hadprevious cautions or convictions that affectedthe arresting officer’s decision. Of the 871cannabis possession offences, just under 50 percent (432) of arrestees were brought into the

station for a simple possession offence. Therewas, however, considerable variation across thesites. Site 1 arrests accounted for 66 per cent ofall ‘possession only’ arrests; the equivalentfigures for Sites 2, 3 and 4 were 17, 14 and 3 percent respectively. Officers from Sites 1, 2 and 3charged over a third of those they had arrested.In Site 4, however, 13 per cent of simplepossession offenders were charged. Figure 6illustrates case disposals for simple possessionarrestees.2

Table 1 How cannabis offences came to light

Site 1 Percentage Sites 2, 3 and 4 Percentage

Police-initiated stop and search 257 56 49 12Other offence 102 23 175 42Vehicle or house search 40 9 117 28Obvious use 29 6 37 9Public- or intelligence-initiated search 14 3 31 8Other 15 3 5 1

Total 457 100 414 100

Figure 6 Case disposals for simple possession offences following arrest

Juvenile14%

Charged38%

Other14%

Cautioned34%

27


Almost all (94 per cent) of those arrested forsimple possession were male; the average agewas 23, ranging from 11 to 62. In total, 59 percent of the possession only population werefrom a BME background. In our first policingcannabis study, in 2002, we found that someofficers specialised in cannabis possessionarrests; across the four sites 11 per cent ofofficers accounted for 20 per cent of the arrests.In 2004/05, comparable findings emerged andwe again found officers who quite obviouslyspecialised in arresting possession-onlyoffenders. We found that 304 officers wereresponsible for 432 arrests; however, 9 per centof officers were responsible for 25 per cent of allsimple possession arrests and 2 per centaccounted for 10 per cent of the arrests. Of theofficers who had made three or more arrests in a12-month period, only two had arrested thesame individual more than once.3

Cannabis as a by-product of another offence

Possession offences sometimes come to light inthe course of an investigation for other offences.For example, the police may arrest a suspect foran unrelated offence, such as being drunk anddisorderly, and then discover cannabis. In datacollected for 2004/05 we found a third of allpossession arrests came to light as a by-productof another offence. The observation below is anillustration of this.

03.45: I was accompanying officers whoresponded to a call about a man who wasattempting to gain access to a propertyagainst the wishes of the occupant – his ex-partner. Whilst they were driving to thehouse they received information that they

were the second set of officers to visit theproperty that night. The police had beencalled to the address four times in theprevious two weeks. Each time it had beenfor the same reason.

When they arrived the officers discoveredthe man outside the property, he wasasked by one of the officers why he hadreturned to the property. The suspect, a 45-year-old black man, stated that it was hisbirthday and that he wanted to speak tohis ex-girlfriend.

The man’s ex-partner informed the officersthat she didn’t want to speak to him andwanted him removed from the property.The officers decided to arrest him for beingdrunk and disorderly. A police van wascalled and arrived. The man washandcuffed and led to the van to besearched. On emptying his pockets a smallamount of herbal cannabis (£5–10 worth)was found. The man asked the officer if hewould throw it in a puddle and forgetabout it. The arresting officer replied thathe couldn’t, though the van driversuggested that he should be given a streetwarning as the amount was so small.

On the way back to the station the twoofficers discussed what they thoughtshould happen to the man. One of theofficers thought he was suitable for a streetwarning, the other believed he should becharged as he had previous convictions fordrug offences and was already underarrest for another offence.

Continued overleaf

28


Although it’s only cannabis it’s enough to bringthem into the station for further enquiries,especially for further and outstanding offences.

It’s vague. Sometimes you get a good feelingabout someone and you need to get them in [tothe station]. A spliff gives you the opportunity todo that.

[Having the power of arrest is right] because Ithink we are losing detecting a lot of offences bynot arresting. We don’t do as many housesearches. We are losing out on chances to findother offences.

With such considerable support for thistheory we decided to revisit the issue todiscover if, since January 2004, the statisticsshowed a change in the number of seriouscrimes detected either after or alongside acannabis possession offence. From the 871cannabis possession arrests, 66 people had alsobeen arrested for other more serious offences.4

Collectively, the 66 had been arrested for 86serious offences, of which 41 resulted in acharge. These 41 offences were committed by 26different people. In only seven cases (less than 1per cent) did a cannabis arrest lead officers todiscover a more serious offence. Table 2 outlinesthe serious offences and their disposals.

Echoing our findings from 2000, we foundlittle evidence to suggest that cannabis arrestsled officers to detect other more serious crimes.Again, it would appear that, while the theoryhas widespread support among operationalofficers, the available evidence does notsubstantiate the assertion.

During the course of our fieldwork wewitnessed a number of different incidents whenthe police decided to arrest. Below is an extract

04.00: Whilst the man was being bookedinto custody he commented: ‘I don’tdeserve to be here, this is a joke – I’ve donenothing wrong’. It was at this point thearresting officer informed him that it wasout of their hands because his case wouldbe dealt with by the Case Progression Unit(CPU) the following morning.

By the time the officers finished preparingthe file they both thought the man shouldbe charged with the offence. It hademerged that the arrestee was well knownto the police for various offences and hadbeen cautioned for cannabis possessionthree times since 1988. It was the previouscautions that tipped the balance in favourof charging.

Cannabis leading to the discovery of other

more serious offences

In our first study a number of officershighlighted that cannabis should remain anarrestable offence because it often led to thediscovery of other more serious offences. Whilethis certainly occurred from time to time, casesturned out to be very rare.

In our current study, 59 per cent of officersthought the Government was wrong toreclassify cannabis to a Class C drug and citedthe frequency with which they discovered othermore serious offences as one of the reasons.Asked why they thought the Government wasright to retain the power of arrest, they againmost frequently cited that cannabis possessionoffences often led to or were associated withother more serious crimes, as the followingthree officers argued:

29


from our fieldwork notes that outlines anincident where the police considered arrestingto be the most appropriate course of action.

Table 2 Serious arrestable offences and their disposals

Offence Charge Caution No further action Other

Supply Class A 18 0 8 6Burglary 8 0 2 8Robbery 4 0 7 5Racially aggravated offences 2 0 0 0Firearms offences 8 0 1 5Attempt murder 1 0 0 0Grievous bodily harm 0 0 1 2

Total 41 0 19 26

13.45: I was accompanying officers on footpatrol when they saw two young menapproaching them. The officers recognisedone of them and told me that he was awell-known cannabis dealer. The officersapproached the two and, as they did, onethrew what appeared to be a small packetfrom his right hand; he then attempted torun past the two officers. The officerscaught up with him, stopped him and thenretrieved the packet. Inside the packetwere five small self-seal bags of herbalcannabis worth £10 each. The young manwas arrested for possession. He wasparticularly unhappy with the arrest,claiming that the cannabis was not his. Hestarted to struggle so was handcuffedwhilst the officers waited for a police vanto arrive.

14.15: The police van arrived andtransported all of us back to the station.Whilst we were in the police van the two

officers discussed the arrest. One of theofficers wanted to arrest the man forpossession with intent to supply but toldme: ‘it’s not worth the hassle with the CPS[Crown Prosecution Service]’. He explainedthat, if he had arrested the man forpossession with intent to supply, in hisexperience the CPS would have advisedhim to drop it to a possession charge. Theofficer therefore saw no point in preparinga supply case when it would inevitably bedropped to a possession charge.

14.30: The young man was booked intocustody. A strip search was authorised asthe custody sergeant suspected that theman had been selling cannabis. The searchyielded no further drugs. The custodysergeant then asked the officers if they haddecided against a supply charge in view ofCPS practice. The officers confirmed thatwas the reason. Before going to his cell theyoung man requested a solicitor.

15.00: The two officers discussed thepossible outcome of the case and agreed

Continued overleaf

30


that as it was his first offence he wouldprobably receive a caution. However if hecontinued to deny the offence it waspossible he could end up being charged.The officers later told me that the youngman had been arrested for possessionbefore, but was released without charge ashis father had intervened and claimed hisright to diplomatic immunity. On thisoccasion diplomatic immunity was sought,but refused. The young man was finallycharged with the offence.

Street warnings

ACPO guidance states that, when an officerdiscovers a simple cannabis possession offence,the presumption should be against arresting. Aswe have seen, BCUs may under somecircumstances adopt policies that steer awayfrom issuing street warnings; but three out ofour four sites encouraged the use of streetwarnings as an efficient and effective way todeal with simple possession offences. Acrossour four sites almost two-thirds (92) of ourpolice interviewees had issued a street warning.In Site 3 all but seven officers had issued a streetwarning. Interestingly, Site 3 comprised thegreatest number of probationer interviews; thismay simply reflect that more experiencedofficers, on encountering a case suitable for astreet warning, have encouraged the lessexperienced PC to gain the necessary policingskills, or it may reflect that this group of officerswill have had no experience of policingcannabis as a Class B drug and may perhaps bemore willing to issue a street warning.

We asked those officers who had issued astreet warning to describe the eventssurrounding their last encounter and to outlinewhy they had issued a warning. Below are someof the circumstances in which officers issuedstreet warnings:

We stopped a vehicle in the early hours of themorning, and noticed a strong smell of cannabiscoming from the car. There were two adults inthe car, neither had any previous drug convictionsor street cautions. We told them they were goingto be detained for a search, they handed it[cannabis] over so were given a street warning.

We stopped a male that matched the descriptionof a robbery suspect. He was searched forpossession of stolen goods. We asked him if hehad anything on him he shouldn’t have. He said‘yes’ and handed over a small amount ofcannabis. He was given a street warning.

Deciding on whether to issue a streetwarning or arrest is often dependent on morethan one factor. We asked officers (n = 88) whatthey considered important when decidingbetween the two. Sixty-two officers stated thatthe amount of cannabis often guided their initialdecision. Outside of the formal interview anumber qualified this by stating that, if theamount was the size of an Oxo cube or smaller,then that to them signified personal use. Anindividual’s offending history was highlightedby 56 officers as important, especially if thathistory included any cannabis offences; the ageof the offender was also an important factor, aswas the location of the offence. Just over aquarter of officers also stated that the attitude ofthe offender was an important guide. Otherdeterminants highlighted by officers included

31


the time of day, whether it was a busy shift andwhether cannabis was considered a policingpriority. The following quotes exemplify howofficers approached the decision:

The first thing is the attitude test – if they’re anabsolute idiot they’ll get taken in. If I can give awarning, I’ll give a warning. They have to fullyadmit the offence, not deny that it’s theirs. It’salso dependent on their location, age, what theyare like and if I’m busy.

If they are known to us, whether they have anyprevious, how much they’ve got on them. It alsodepends on which officer you are with as well.

Their behaviour affects it [decision to street warnor arrest] a lot. If they are being an arse they’ll getlocked up. Other factors I consider: if they’reknown to us – a repeat offender will be arrested;if you’re looking to build an ASBO [Anti-socialBehaviour Order] on someone it’s good to get anarrest. Also the time of the shift – if it’s 6.30 a.m.and you’re off at 7, they ain’t going to getarrested.

One of the key objectives of reclassifyingcannabis and encouraging street warnings wasto free up officer time to deal with other moreharmful substances. While we cannot commenton whether operational officers are nowconcentrating on heroin and crack as opposed tocannabis, we can state that 83 per cent of officerswho had issued a street warning stated that ithad indeed saved them time. The followingobservation illustrates not only how officersapproach the decision but also how quicklycannabis offenders can be dealt with if they arestreet warned.

12.10: I was accompanying officers whodrove past a group of young men standingoutside a row of shops. Two were standingslightly apart from the rest of the group.One of the officers said that he had seenone of the young men throw a small wrapof something over his shoulder. The vanwas stopped and four officers approachedthe two. The officers quickly made thedecision to search them. Neither offeredmuch in the way of protest. One wasfound in possession of a small amount ofherbal cannabis and a cannabis grinder,and immediately admitted that both werehis. The officers asked the police operatorfor a name and background check. Thepolice operator was also asked to check thelocal intelligence system for any previouscannabis offences. The check revealed thatthe young man had a cannabis possessionoffence that dated back to 2001 but had notbeen in trouble since. The local intelligencesystem also had a report from anotherofficer which stated that – whilst there wasno evidence – the young man wassuspected of selling Class A drugs in thearea that he had been stopped in. Theofficer decided that the young man waseligible for a street warning.

The officer asked the young man a seriesof straightforward questions. He wasasked what the substance was; he repliedit was herbal cannabis. He was then askedwhether he was aware that cannabis wasstill illegal. He replied that he thought itwas OK to carry small amounts of

Continued overleaf

32


• an individual smoking in public (threedifferent situations)

• an individual smoking in a park frequentedby young people

• the offender being a young person

• the offender having a previous cannabisconviction.

In all of these cases the grounds to arrestwere present. When considering these scenarios,officers often found that deciding on the mostappropriate disposal option was not as clear-cutas simply following either their force or ACPOguidelines.

In only two of the scenarios were officersmore likely to arrest than either street warn orinformally dispose of the drug. One of theseinvolved discovering an individual smokingcannabis in a park frequented by young people.Placed in this scenario officers were almostequally split between arresting (46 per cent) andissuing a street warning (41 per cent). In anothersituation we outlined the following incident toofficers:

A robbery has recently been committed and you(the police) are looking for the suspects. Twoindividuals are stopped; it quickly becomesapparent they are not the suspects, but they arecaught smoking a spliff. They have no othercannabis on them, one admits to having aprevious caution for shoplifting. They are politeand courteous and causing no obvious bother tothe public.

In this situation less than 5 per cent ofofficers thought they would arrest the offenders,even though they were smoking in public. Justunder a third stated that they would informally

cannabis. The officer told him that itwasn’t. The officer then asked what heintended to do with the cannabis; theyoung man replied it was for his ownpersonal use to smoke at home. The officerrecorded the information in his pocketbook. The young man was asked whetherhe would accept a street warning to whichhe replied ‘yes’. He then signed theofficer’s pocket book. He was thenallowed to leave. After the young man hadleft I asked the officer why he decided tostreet warn rather than arrest. The officerstated that the young man hadn’t had anydrug convictions since 2001; he admittedthat the cannabis was his and it was asmall amount. In total the encounter lasted20 minutes.

Street warning for aggravated possession

offences

The ACPO guidelines outline various scenarioswhere an arrest is more appropriate than a streetwarning. This guidance – even if adopted by anofficer’s force and BCU – will not always befollowed by operational officers. Although anoverwhelming majority of them backed theGovernment’s decision to retain the power ofarrest, officers also outlined occasions whenthey had issued a street warning even thoughthe offender had committed what would beconsidered an aggravated possession offence.We placed officers in eight different scenariosand asked whether they would arrest, issue astreet warning, seek guidance or informallydispose of the cannabis. In six of the situationsthere were aggravating circumstances. Thesituations were:

33


dispose of the drug, often qualifying theirdecision by stating that looking for a robberysuspect was far more important than dealingwith a cannabis offender.

Officers from Site 1 – where a proactivearrest policy was in place – still, however,exercised a considerable degree of discretionwhen deciding on whether to arrest or issue astreet warning. In this site officers stated thatthey would arrest in three out of the eightscenarios we presented them with. Interestingly,in Sites 1 and 2, officers were more likely toarrest an individual with a previous caution forcannabis (even though no other aggravatingcircumstances were present) than theircolleagues in Sites 3 and 4. Indeed, even whenpresented with a situation where a smallamount of cannabis was found on the victim ofa crime, three officers from Site 1 stated thatthey would arrest rather than deal with theoffence in any other way. Officers from Site 2 –in all but one scenario – were more likely to usetheir discretion and informally dispose of thecannabis than their colleagues from the otherthree areas. Officers’ responses to the scenariosillustrate the complexity of ‘real-world’decisions even when they have both nationaland local guidance to help them.

Disposing of a cannabis offence informally

In our first policing cannabis study we foundthat deciding to exercise discretion – withspecific regard to cannabis – was not as unusualas other researchers (Fitzgerald, 1999) hadpreviously reported. Sixty-nine per cent ofofficers from our first study reported havingdealt with a cannabis offender informally.Elsewhere (Warburton et al., 2005) we outlined

how reclassification might impact on informaldisposals. We suggested that there was apossibility that reclassification could trigger areduction in the use of informal disposals, thusbringing more people into contact with thecriminal justice system, resulting in a ‘net-widening’ effect. However, another possibilitywas that reclassification could prompt anincrease in the use of informal action, thusleading the offence to be selectivelydecriminalised. While the impact reclassificationhas had on completely informal action isunmeasurable, our interviews are able to shedsome light on such practice after reclassification.Below are some of the circumstances in whichofficers described taking no formal actionagainst a cannabis offender:

I went past a group of males sat in a parked car. Iwent up to the car and could smell cannabis so Isearched them. The back seat passenger had asmall amount of cannabis which he voluntarilygave up. I dropped the cannabis down the drain.

It was the day before yesterday. I arrestedsomeone on a warrant backed for bail. He hadcannabis on him. We explained to him that whenwe got to custody if he still had it on him it wouldcause us all grief, so he dropped it down thedrain.

Last week I went to a domestic which was just aheated argument really. The neighbours hadcalled us. By the time we got there it was all calmand they were in the process of rolling one [spliff].We went into the house to check everything wasOK, they didn’t have time to hide it. It just wasn’tin anyone’s interest to do anything so we leftthem to it.

34


About three weeks ago there was a car full oflads down a quiet back lane. Four lads were sathaving a smoke. One lad had a small amount –about a joint. I just told him to get rid of it.

We asked officers (n = 150) if they haddisposed of a case of cannabis possessioninformally at any point in their career. Seventy-two stated that they had. We then asked thisgroup if their attitude to using this disposaloption had changed since reclassification.Thirteen stated that they now informallydisposed of more cannabis offences than before.Fifteen stated that, instead of informallydisposing, they were now more inclined to issuea street warning. Finally, 42 believed thatreclassification had not affected their use ofinformal disposals.5 On the basis of this limitedsample, all we can conclude is thatreclassification may be pushing practice in bothdirections – with some offenders being dealtwith more formally than previously and someless.

We also asked those who had neverinformally disposed of a cannabis offence (78) if– now that cannabis was a Class C drug – theywould use this disposal option. Only five statedthey would. The remainder (73) stated that thiswas still not an option for them. Below is anextract from our fieldwork notes, which outlinesan occasion when an officer chose to use hisdiscretion when he encountered a cannabispossession offence.

21.00: I was accompanying officers whowere answering a call to a dispute at ahouse. On arrival they found a very drunkman refusing to leave his friend’s house.

The owner of the flat, who was in awheelchair, didn’t want his friend there ashe feared the neighbours would complainabout the noise. The officers explained tothe visitor that as the property did notbelong to him he had to leave when askedto do so. The officers also explained that ifhe didn’t leave they would have to arresthim. The man agreed to go. Whilstmeandering from room to room the manpicked up a rolled spliff and lit it. One ofthe officers asked him what he thought hewas doing. He replied he was gettingready to leave. The officer informed him ofhis stupidity and explained that lightingup a spliff in front of a police officer wasn’tthe brightest idea. The man commentedthat it was cannabis and that it had beenlegalised. The officer explained to him thatit hadn’t and that he needed to put it outvery quickly to avoid being arrested. Theman continued to debate the issue with theofficer and told him that if it hadn’t beenlegalised he was still able to smoke it in hisown home. The officer informed him hewasn’t and that he was fast losing hispatience with him. He then put the spliffout and continued to wander from room toroom, nonchalantly putting things in abag. A few moments later the man relit thespliff, at which point the officer informedhim that he was moments away frombeing ‘nicked’. He tutted but then put itout. The man was escorted from theproperty and warned not to return therethat night. He drunkenly staggered downthe road.

Continued

35


should arrest persons aged 17 years or underwho are in possession of cannabis for personaluse.(ACPO, 2003, para. 2.4)

However, we found that, across our foursites, this was not always the case and thatofficers had mixed views about the value orgood sense in arresting all teenagers found inpossession.

During our interviews we asked officers ifthey thought young people should be treatedthe same as adults. Forty-one per cent thoughtthat they should and 14 per cent wereundecided on the issue. When we examined thesites separately, we found that officers from Site1 were more inclined to want to treat youngpeople the same as adults. This may reflect thatofficers in this site encounter more drugoffences generally and more Class A offencesspecifically than any of the other sites and thattheir area is a particularly busy one to police.Officers from Site 3 were divided on the issueand, in Sites 2 and 4, officers were more inclinedto think that young people should still bearrested.

Some officers found decisions about youngpeople aged 16 and 17 particularly difficult.Twenty-three officers expressed doubts aboutthe merits of arresting them for a simplepossession offence and thought that youngpeople 16 and upwards should be treated thesame as adults, but under 16s should continueto be policed as they are. Thirteen officersthought that the current arrangements were tootime-consuming and that, to save time, youngpeople should be treated the same as adults. Anumber of officers thought that, rather thanarresting young people, there should be the

After we left the officer explained why hehad dealt with the man in the way he had.He didn’t want to start a busy Saturdaynight shift arresting a drunk with a bit ofcannabis. He also commented that thecustody cells didn’t need to get clogged upwith ‘rubbish arrests’. The shift was alsoshort-staffed, and officers were expecting abusy night as the new licensing laws hadjust come into effect.

Policing young people

The reclassification of cannabis to a Class Cdrug affected the way that adults are policed,but did not – in theory at least – change thepolicing of young people. Procedures fordealing with young people were set out in theCrime and Disorder Act 1998. The Act abolishedjuvenile cautions, replacing them with a systemof reprimands and final warnings. A reprimandmay be given for a first offence – unless itsseverity rules this out. Final warnings must begiven for any second offence following areprimand, or for a first offence of sufficientgravity that a reprimand cannot be given –unless, of course, prosecution is judged the onlyoption.

In Chapter 1 we highlighted that cannabisuse is highest among people in their late teensand early twenties; rates of use, however, haveremained relatively stable for the last ten years.We also highlighted that younger teenagers arealso reporting using cannabis. The 2003 ACPOguidance states that:

The Crime and Disorder Act legislation requiresoffenders to be dealt with at the police station,which, in practice, means that police officers

36


option to involve parents more. Twenty-sixofficers also thought that the current system oftreating young people and adults differentlywas unfair. The following quotes are typical:

You get kids of 15 and 16 trying out alcohol, butthe only power we have is to take it off them. I’dthink it’d save a lot of time [not arresting]. Weshould be able to get the parents involved.

It would be simpler and make it fairer. It justseems a bit unfair for a 16 year old to get nickedfor it and an 18 year old in the same group to geta slap on the wrist and that’s it.

I think some people at 16 or 17 are basicallyadults. I would set the limit at 16 rather than 17and anyone below that would be a straight arrest.

I’d rather it be under 16s that were arrested. I justfeel if you’re 16–17 you’re your own person andcan make your own decisions.

Of the officers who were opposed to treatingyoung people in the same way as adults, 21expressed concerns about the vulnerability ofunder 18s and thought that, for that reasonalone, the status quo should remain. Fiveofficers cited the need for an appropriate adultwhen processing a young person would makeissuing street warnings impossible and 21 statedthat the threat of arrest acted as a deterrent toyoung people using the drug. The quotes belowshow why some officers believed arresting wasalways the right option:

It [arresting] can be a way of stopping them usingat a young age.

When you’re young you don’t weigh up the prosand cons of using cannabis. I think we shouldtake more of an authoritative approach with them.

They [young people] are less aware of the lawand less aware of what is right and wrong, theyare less responsible.

During the course of the interview weplaced officers in a scenario that involved themdiscovering a young person smoking cannabistwo weeks away from their eighteenth birthday.With no other aggravating circumstances, weasked them what they would do in thissituation. Officers from Site 2 were equally splitbetween arresting the young person andinformally disposing of the drug. In Sites 1 and4 officers were clear that they would arrest; inSite 3 only a third of officers stated that theywould arrest.

During the course of our observations wewitnessed a number of incidents of officersencountering young people in possession ofcannabis. The observation below outlines one ofthese situations and highlights the problems forsome officers when encountering a youngperson in possession of cannabis.

20.15: Officers I was with come across twoplain-clothes colleagues who had juststopped two 17-year-old males and foundcannabis on them.

One of the officers briefly outlined thesituation. He explained that they had beenpatrolling the area when they spotted twoblack males smoking a spliff. The officersgot out of the car and stopped them. Theofficers informed them that they weregoing to be searched. One of the youthsoffered up a bag of cannabis. The otheryouth was searched and found inpossession of two bags of herbal cannabis.

37


Each of the three bags held approximately£10 worth of cannabis.

Police checks were done on both youths.One had received a juvenile reprimand;the other had no police record. The officersarrested both for possession of cannabisand called for a police van to take themback to the station.

On route back to the station one of thearresting officers stated that the two hadbeen arrested because they were under 18years. He also indicated that the legalobligation to arrest was unhelpful andoften an inconvenience. He explained thatthe arrest would take up four to five hoursof their time and would be a waste of theirtime as plain-clothed proactive officers.They both thought that their time could beput to better use. Both officers wereparticularly annoyed as their team wasunderstaffed that night. One of the officersmentioned that:

• he would like the option of being ableto take a juvenile home to their parentsrather than having to arrest them

• there ought to be alternative options forhandling young cannabis offenders, asthe criminal justice system is not bestplaced to deal with the matter

• the blanket arrest policy for those under18 years was frustrating and, at times,unhelpful.

The officer also felt that a young person’sexperience of being arrested for cannabispossession might impact negatively ontheir perception of the police. He said thatsome young people in the area were veryanti-police and spit at them or in theirdirection and are very aggressive. Hethought that both arrestees were goodlads; they didn’t have attitude and theyhad listened to what the officers had tosay. The officer felt that being arrested forthis offence might make them anti-policein the future, especially as they believedthey’d done nothing wrong. He alsoindicated that it wasn’t necessarily fair thatsomeone over 18 could receive two streetwarnings in a year and yet one of theseyouths might go to court because he hadpreviously been caught. He believed thatneither should have been arrested.

38

When announcing his intention to reclassifycannabis, the then Home Secretary, DavidBlunkett offered three key reasons for thechange (Home Office, 2005a):

• a reduction in resources devoted to policinglow-level cannabis possession offences

• using these freed-up resources to helpconcentrate on tackling the Class A drugproblem

• placing cannabis in a class that reflected itsrelative harmfulness.

This report has nothing to say on the issue ofrelative harmfulness, except that it’s a task bestleft to doctors, mental health experts andepidemiologists. However, we are in a positionto comment on whether reclassification led toresource savings across our four areas and aboutthe likelihood that these savings werechannelled into tackling Class A drugs.

Has reclassification saved resources?

We asked officers whether the confiscation andwarning process saved them any time. Only 14per cent of police respondents felt that it didnot. Below we have attempted to estimate thesize of the savings – in terms of both officerhours and money – accrued by our four researchsites. Our calculations are crude ones and do notprovide exact costs. Instead they provide anindication as to savings that can be generated byusing street warnings instead of arrests.

In our previous report, using custody recorddata, we estimated that an arrest for cannabispossession absorbs, on average, five hours perofficer per case. Our estimations were similar tothose presented by the police to the Home

Affairs Select Committee on Drug Policy. Wehave also assumed that officers work in pairs.Thus, to calculate the overall cost of policingcannabis as a Class B drug, we multiplied thenumber of possession offences per site by five(hours) by an officer’s hourly rate, then by two(as two officers normally deal with the offence).As a police constable’s starting salary is £9.22per hour (GMB Union, 2005), we set an officer’shourly rate at £13 to account for the extra costsof more experienced officers.

During our observation work, officers statedthat it takes anywhere between 45 minutes andtwo hours to complete the confiscation andstreet warning process. One of the streetwarnings we observed took 80 minutes frompoint of contact to completion of the relevantpaperwork. This included:

• the stop and search and street interview

• police checks (national and local systems)

• writing an account of the event for theoffender to sign

• returning to the police station

• inputting the information on to the crimemanagement system and forceintelligence system

• writing a stop and search form

• inputting the details on to the drugseizures database

• transferring the drugs to the propertystore.

We were given a variety of estimates for thetime it takes to complete this process, but haveused 80 minutes to represent the average. Table

4 The consequences of reclassification

39


3 shows the savings in time and moneygenerated by the use of street warnings acrossour four research sites during 2004/05.

Across the four sites a total of £38,072 wassaved through the use of street warnings. Thisequates to just under 3,000 officer hours(working on the basis that an hour of policetime is £13). Using the same calculations, wedecided to estimate the potential impact thatreclassification had on resource and financialsavings for cannabis possession offences inEngland and Wales. As national street warningdata is only available for a nine-month period –April to December 2004 (27,520) – we havefactored up the figure to provide a 12-monthtotal (36,693).1 Table 4 shows the approximate

financial and resource savings generated byreclassification during 2004. During 2004,savings across the 43 forces were likely toamount to three-and-a-half-million pounds orjust over a quarter of a million (269,327) officerhours.

Clearly, busy urban areas (such as Sites 2 and3) will have the potential to profit greatly fromthe introduction of street warnings. However,what remains unclear is whether any of thesavings resulted in a redirection of officer timeand money to policing Class A offences – one ofthe original aims of reclassification. Our work isable to shed some light on this issue. During ourobservations we rarely witnessed any shiftoperating at their full staff complement;

Table 3 Monetary savings through the use of street warnings in 2004/05

Cost and resource breakdown for 2004/05 Site 1 Site 2 Site 3 Site 4

Total number of cannabis possession offences 2004/05 584 370 246 70A: Total cost of cannabis offences if policed as a Class B drug (£) 75,920 48,100 31,980 9,100B: Total cost of arrests during (Class C) (£) 59,410 29,380 18,720 5,720C: Total cost of street warnings during (Class C) (£) 4,392 4,980 3,527 899D: Total cost of cannabis policed as a Class C drug (B + C) (£) 63,802 34,360 22,247 6,619E: Total monetary savings (A – D) (£) 12,118 13,740 9,733 2,481

Table 4 Monetary savings through the use of street warnings in England and Wales during 2004

Cost and resource breakdown for 2004 England and Wales

Total number of cannabis possession offences 82,183a

A: Total cost of cannabis possession offences if policed as a Class B drug (£) 10,683,790B: Total cost of arrests (Class C) (£) 5,913,700C: Total cost of street warnings (Class C) (£) 1,268,844D: Total cost of cannabis policed as a Class C drug (£) 7,182,544E: Total monetary savings (A – D) (£) 3,501,246

a This figure has been arrived at by adding the factored-up street warning figure (36,693) with thenumber of individuals coming into contact with the police for a possession offence (73,010).

40


consequently, at peak times, officers struggled toreact to the demands placed on them by thepublic and other emergency services and onlyhad the chance to engage in any proactive workin the early hours of the morning. It is unlikely,therefore, that the resources freed up bysubstituting arrests with street warnings will beused to proactively tackle heroin and crack-cocaine offences. In reality, the savings are likelyto result in officers responding slightly quickerto public demand. This is clearly a benefit, but itis not one that is likely to have a significantimpact on Class A drug problems.

Policing cannabis as a Class C drug: some

unintended consequences

All legal reform runs the risk of unintendedconsequences. Unsurprisingly, reclassificationbrought with it its own set of consequences,some of which were intended and others whichwere not. During a parliamentary debate, theHome Office minister Caroline Flint indicatedthat:

… reclassification will provide an opportunity tointroduce a consistent and properly thought outregime for the policing of cannabis in line with itsstatus as a Class C drug.(Hansard, 29 October 2003, para. 336)

Below we discuss how reclassification – in itscurrent format – has probably exaggerated theinconsistencies in the policing of cannabisoffences and not, as originally intended,provided a more consistent approach. We havealso outlined a number of other unintendedconsequences generated by this reform.

Are possession offences policed consistently

and fairly?

Previous chapters have shown that variationexists in the way cannabis possession offencesare policed. The addition of street warnings hasnow provided officers with three disposaloptions: issuing a street warning; arresting; orinformally disposing of the offence. As we haveillustrated, policing cannabis is not alwayscarried out according to the rule book and theeventual outcome of being found in possessionis far from predictable. It depends on manyfactors, including the views of the officer, thecircumstances in which the incident occurs, theamount of cannabis found, the demeanour andattitude of the offender, and local policy. Thedecision process is quite often guided by morethan one factor and local, force or ACPOguidance is by no means always at the forefrontof this process.

A degree of variation in policing practice isinevitable, and arguably desirable. The difficultpolicy judgement is in identifying the point atwhich acceptable variation has becomeinequitable disparity. There can be no doubt thatthere is considerable variation. As one officerput it:

If it’s busy sometimes we tend not to arrest, butif it’s quiet we might be more likely to make anarrest – I know it’s not fair, but that’s what it’s likesometimes.

The level of unpredictability is likely toinfluence the degree to which the public viewthe policing of the offence as legitimate. Ifpeople are unsure about what will happen tothem when they are caught with cannabis, havebeen dealt with differently by different officers

41


or have witnessed others being dealt withdifferently, it is likely they will question thefairness of such actions. Ultimately, if the publicview the approach of their local police asinconsistent, the likely outcome will be thatconfidence in low-level police work will beaffected and the ability of patrol officers topolice by consent will be weakened.

In developing effective and consistentpolicing strategies, senior police managers needto encourage operational officers to considerwhether the action they are inclined to take is aproportionate response to the offence. If officers’actions are guided by proportionality they arefar more likely to enjoy the support of their localcommunities and their actions will be viewed aslegitimate and fair. Arresting is more liable to beperceived as proportionate if an individual is arepeat offender or has been caught in an areawith cannabis-related problems than if they area first-time adult offender caught carryingcannabis in their pocket while walking downthe street.

Has reclassification affected use of informal

disposals?

Like our first study of cannabis policing, thisresearch has shown that some officers, in somecircumstances, will deal with cannabis offencescompletely informally. The fact that this occursis rarely acknowledged and it had little saliencein the debate about reclassification.

Elsewhere we have argued thatreclassification is likely to influence thefrequency of informal action in two ways(Warburton et al., 2005). The first is thatreclassification signals to the police thatcannabis possession is to be treated as a lessserious offence than hitherto, with the

implication that totally informal action is nowmore acceptable. The second is that officers whopreviously would have informally disposed ofthe offence will start to issue street warningsinstead. The considerations here are that streetwarnings are not much more time-consumingthan informal action and that they protectofficers against accusations of malpracticewithout imposing on the offender thestigmatising burden of a criminal record.

One aim of reclassification was that it wouldresult in fewer offenders being drawn into thepolice ‘net’. The enforcement figures for 2004show that there were 45,490 cannabis possessionoffenders in the post-reclassification year and,for the last nine months of this period, 27,520street warnings. Assuming that street warningscontinued at the same rate for the remainingthree months, this yields a total of 82,183 formalencounters for cannabis possession offences –4,683 more than in 2003 (77,500). Reclassificationmay thus have reduced the volume of informaldisposals and increased the numbers being dealtwith formally. The consequences of this ‘net-widening’ effect are hard to assess. On the onehand, those who now receive street warningsinstead of informal warnings may feel a littlemore aggrieved at what will be experienced as amore intrusive form of policing. On the otherhand, those who are spared a caution (or even aconviction) may feel that they have been dealtwith in a much more proportionate andappropriate way.

Increasing sanction detections

The Home Office – like all other governmentspending departments – is required to meetPublic Service Agreement (PSA) targets that itagrees with the Treasury as part of the triennial

42


process of resource allocation. Failure to meetPSA targets carries serious implications for thedepartment itself and for the services for whichit has responsibility.2 One of the Home Office’scurrent targets is PSA3, to increase the annualnumber of crimes for which an offender isbrought to justice to 1.25 million by 2007/08(Home Office, 2005b). PSA3 is a target that issalient in the working lives of BCU commandersand other senior staff. Significantly for ourpurposes, the Home Office has agreed with thepolice that street warnings for cannabispossession count as sanction detections and cantherefore contribute towards meeting PSA3.

From the perspective of senior policemanagers, there are obvious advantagesassociated with increasing rates of streetwarnings related to improved performance onPSA3. An inspector in Site 1, for example, saidthat, despite parts of the area operating a‘blanket arrest’ policy, he was coming under‘increased pressure to increase the number ofstreet warnings in the area’. This pressure wascoming from the area’s senior command team.

Officers from another of our sites, at times,purposefully targeted offences of cannabispossession to ensure that they met theirmonthly ‘sanction detection’ target. Ouranalysis of their custody record and streetwarning datasets showed that a third (49 out of145) of the area’s street warnings were derivedfrom the work of a passive drug dog3 at a localtrain station. Roughly once a month therewould be a number of street warnings issued tooffenders identified by the drugs dog; in onemonth 20 warnings were issued over two days.A number of officers interviewed for the studyindicated that the last street warning theyissued was part of passive drug operation, as

the officer below described:

We were on a drugs dog operation at the trainstation. The dog smelt cannabis on a malecoming through the station. We searched himand found a small amount of cannabis on him. Hehad no previous and was given a warning.

In a meeting with the area’s senior officer,we asked about the use of passive drugs dogs.He said that, when his numbers for sanctiondetections were down, he would send outofficers with police drug dogs to catch peoplewith drugs – predominantly cannabis – toensure the area met its monthly targets. We donot know whether such consequences wereanticipated when the Home Office agreed toinclude street warnings in the list of sanctiondetections. However, whether or not it wasintended by managers, the practice of boostingthe number of sanction detections by issuingstreet warnings for possession offences does notseem to be isolated to our four research sites. In2005/06 there were 1.3 million sanctiondetections in England and Wales for all crimetypes, of which 114,000 – or one in 11 – were foroffences of cannabis possession. Of the sanctiondetections for cannabis possession, 63,600 weredealt with by street warnings and 50,000 byarrest (Walker et al., 2006).4 Thus one in 20sanction detections was achieved by issuingstreet warnings for cannabis possession.

On the basis of this research we can say that,in some police force areas, the practice of issuingstreet warnings is driven substantially bypressure to meet the Home Office’s PSA3 targetrather than by concern about the scale ofproblems associated with cannabis use. Wecannot say how endemic the practice is acrossthe country, however. We leave it to others to

43


judge whether it is a good use of police time toseek out cannabis offenders simply to meet therequirements of PSA3. But, in reaching such ajudgement, it is worth considering what mighthave happened if street warnings had beendisallowed as sanction detections. One

possibility is that police effort would have beenrefocused on other forms of crime; the other isthat officers would have done their bit to ‘closethe justice gap’ by arresting people forpossession instead of issuing them with streetwarnings.

44

This study examined the policing of cannabis asa Class C drug at a time when there wasconsiderable uncertainty about whethercannabis would remain a Class C drug or revertback to Class B.1 Overall our findings suggestthat the reclassification of cannabis from Class Bto Class C has had a smaller impact thanadvocates of the change hoped and thanopponents feared. The key points to emergefrom the study are as follows.

• ACPO guidance – and implicit Home Officepolicy – was that a simple cannabispossession offence with no aggravatingfactors should result in a street warning.

• The overall number of people coming intoformal contact with the police for apossession offence increased from 2000 to2004/05 suggesting that street warnings aresubstituting in part for informal warnings.

• Police officers were quite evenly dividedabout the merits of reclassification, but mostsupported the decision to retain the power ofarrest for possession offences.

• Officers’ understanding of the newarrangements for dealing with possessionoffences was variable.

• Across the four sites there was considerablevariation in the interpretation of the ACPOguidelines on aggravated possession.

• Street warnings were quite widely used as away of dealing with offences of cannabispossession, but they were by no means thenorm and they were used little in some areas.

• The recording and monitoring of streetwarnings was poor at both a national and

local level, and has led to the inconsistentpolicing of cannabis offences in some areas.

• Some police managers were targetingcannabis users to increase their ‘sanctiondetection’ rates.

• While informal warnings continued to beused to deal with possession offences, streetwarnings were substituting for some of theseand also for arrests.

• The amount of police time saved through theavoidance of arrests was less than originallypredicted.

• Nearly all the officers we interviewed hadencountered members of the public whothought cannabis had been legalised.

• Almost half our sample of officers wanted topolice young people in the same way asadults and issue them with street warnings.

• There was widespread confusion among theinternet sample and young people about thesubtleties of the changes to the cannabis lawand cannabis policing.

Although we found ourselves describing theimpact of an amendment that had in practiceleft police powers and the law largelyunchanged, our findings are an importantindicator of how the new arrangements werefirst perceived, how they have settled down andwhere possible revisions need to be made andguidance given. In this chapter, we haveaddressed five issues:

• the value of street warnings

• policing young people caught in possessionof cannabis

5 Discussion and conclusions

45

Discussion and conclusions

• recording and monitoring street warningsand arrests

• communicating a clear and consistentmessage

• the possible impact of the Serious OrganisedCrime and Police Act 2005 (SOCaP).

The value of street warnings

This study has charted how street warningsoperated in the first year of the newarrangements. The final phases of the studywere carried out among considerableuncertainty about the future. For a time, itseemed probable that the then new HomeSecretary, Charles Clarke, would reverse theclassification of cannabis to Class B. This wouldhave probably triggered an end to the practiceof street warnings for cannabis possession; itwould have been politically difficult, if notimpossible, to announce a re-reclassificationunaccompanied by any ‘toughening up’ of thepolice response.

In the event, Charles Clarke retained theClass C classification and ACPO retained itsadvice about the disposal of possession offences.The presumption remains that people found inpossession will receive street warnings. Ourown view is that Charles Clarke’s decision wasright and that street warnings remain aproportionate disposal for the offence inquestion. We also believe that his successor asHome Secretary, John Reid, should continue toview the classification of cannabis in the samepragmatic way as his two predecessors. Thearguments that originally supported the policyof street warnings as a substitute for arrestingoffenders remain persuasive. While the policing

of cannabis will probably remain one of thetension points in relations between police andyoung people, the new arrangements shouldprove less corrosive than the previous ones.There are also welcome savings to police time –even if these are somewhat smaller thanoriginally envisaged.

The guidance has been taken up to differentdegrees in different places. Some of thisvariation reflects local responses to localcircumstances. The BCU commander in Site 1had a well-considered rationale for deviatingfrom the guidance in those areas with opencannabis markets, for example. Some of thevariations in practice will not so much reflectlocal circumstances as local preferences. This isobviously in tension with the principle ofconsistency in justice – but there arenevertheless arguments for localism in settingcriminal policy. While differences in local policymay or may not be tolerable, it strikes us asmore obviously questionable that cannabispolicing should be distorted by governmenttargets for ‘narrowing the justice gap’. It isimportant for central government to discouragedrug operations designed simply to help localpolice hit their PSA3 targets – as discussed inChapter 4.

Policing young people caught in possession

of cannabis

It is difficult to strike a comfortable balancebetween protecting young people from harmand allowing them the freedom to live theirlives as they want, while maintaining thelegitimacy of police authority. The frameworkfor the current youth justice system establishedunder the 1998 Crime and Disorder Act was

46


designed to prevent young people fromoffending. One of the principal aims of thesystem is to provide a structure and frameworkto help young people desist from offending andto shield them from any unnecessary exposureto the formal criminal justice system,particularly for minor or trivial offences. Thesystem of reprimands and final warnings wasintroduced as part of this process. The ‘two-chance’ system was intended to replace the –substantially discredited – system of multiplejuvenile cautions with a clear, predictable,staged process, whereby prosecution was acertainty for a third offence.

Since the introduction of these provisions,however, concern has grown about theinflexibility of a system that can propel a youngoffender into court proceedings for a very minoroffence. For example, the Audit Commission’sreport Youth Justice 2004 concluded that:

While some young offenders are benefiting fromearly pre-court interventions, too many minoroffences are taking up valuable court time.(Audit Commission, 2004)

In the report, the Commission suggests thatcourt time would be better focused on persistentand serious offenders. In meeting this aim, itsuggests that minor offences could be moreappropriately dealt with outside of the courtsystem and that the Crown Prosecution Servicecould refer young offenders who commit minoroffences to a Youth Offender Panel for a three-month fixed period. If this model were to beadopted the Commission believed that court timeand resources would be released, enabling youthcourts to review specific cases and, if necessary,alter sentences to respond to the possiblechanging circumstances of young offenders.

The Government accepted the principle ofkeeping minor offences out of the courts wherepossible, but rejected the recommendation. Itwas regarded as unworkable to refer youngoffenders to a Youth Offender Panel without acourt hearing. It was argued that the proposedarrangements would confuse young peoplewho, at present, are fully aware that, if they arearrested on a third occasion, they will becharged and brought to court. This study isunable to address the general question about theneed for more flexibility over prosecution –except to say that we can see the attraction ofallowing a third pre-court intervention alongthe lines of the conditional caution introducedfor adults.

However, it does strike us as unfair that theprevious ACPO guidelines clearly directedofficers to arrest under 18s while remindingthem that they retained the discretion to streetwarn those over 18. The 2003 guidelines wereunambiguous in their advice to officers ondealing with young people and stated:

Youth offenders will continue to be dealt withthrough the Crime and Disorder Act provisionsand not this Cannabis Enforcement Guidance.The Crime and DisorderAct legislation requiresoffenders to be dealt with at the police stationwhich, in practice, means that police officersshould arrest persons aged 17 years or underwho are in possession of cannabis for personaluse.(ACPO, 2003, S. 2.4)

It is even more unacceptable that under 18smay have to appear in court – if there has been aprevious final warning – while their slightlyolder ‘adult’ friend may well not even acquire acriminal record for their offence. We appreciate

47


that these disparities are impelled byconsiderations about the welfare of teenagers,but they will surely strike the offenders inquestion as irrational and unfair (as indeed theystruck many of the officers interviewed in thisstudy). Encouragingly, in a bid to address thisbalance, it would appear that ACPO is nowurging operational officers to consider other lessintrusive ways of dealing with young people.Instead of arresting, the draft 2006 advice statesthat:

It is accepted that in some cases a police officermay find it necessary to arrest that [young]person in order to obtain the admission/evidencerequired. However, consideration should be givento less intrusive means if possible such as takingthe young person home, verifying their name andaddress and referring the case for a disposaldecision.(ACPO, 2006, S. 3.5.2)

While the outcome may be the same asbefore, in that the young person may bereprimanded, given a final warning or charged,there now appears to have been a shift inemphasis – away from entangling a youngperson in the criminal justice process to activelykeeping them away from an arrest situation andtherefore a police station.

In light of the new emphasis found in thedraft ACPO guidance and the support fromofficers we interviewed we think that there is agood case for extending downwards the systemof street warnings, at least to include 17 yearolds in certain circumstances – at the discretionof the officer involved, and provided thatmeasures can be put in place to notify parents orcarers, and that, where appropriate, the youngperson can be referred to sources of specialist

advice. It would only make sense to do this,however, if street warnings were not counted asreprimands and thus did not contribute to the‘totting-up’ process.2

Officers often mentioned to us that concernsabout the welfare of young people found inpossession of cannabis would inhibit them fromissuing street warnings, were this ever apossibility. One innovative approach forproviding support to young cannabis users isthe Kent Drug Intervention Support Programme(DISP).3 Those who have been found inpossession of Class B or Class C drugs can electto participate in the DISP, which providesinformation and education about substancemisuse. If the young person completes theprogramme, no further action is taken againstthem and they are not deemed to have receiveda reprimand or final warning – although thedisposal is viewed as having the same gravity asa reprimand. This strikes us as a model of goodpractice.

Recording and monitoring street warnings

Earlier in this report we highlighted thevariation that exists in recording street warningsand the differences in officers’ awareness of thestreet warning procedure. Chapter 3 discussedthe disproportionate representation of youngBME males in the population of those who werewarned or arrested and it also highlighted thepoor recording by officers in Site 3 of the ages ofthose they street warned. To ensure streetwarnings are correctly issued and properlymonitored we think it important that forcesintroduce straightforward recording proceduresand transparent internal monitoring policies,and that they keep these under regular review.

48


During our research we uncovered twoparticular problems that affected the effectiverecording and monitoring of street warnings.These were:

• officers being unaware of the properrecording procedures

• street warning data being held across anumber of datasets, making internalmonitoring impossible.

Although the reclassification debate was alengthy and protracted one, it would appearthat, once decided, little or no time was spentdesigning a reliable administrative process torecord and monitor street warnings. Theconsideration given to the importance ofrecording and monitoring seems somewhatscant.

It is essential to compile and maintainreliable statistics on the disposal of cannabispossession offences. Such statistics are essential.First, they are needed for assessing the impactof reclassification and for reviewing theoperation of the new system. Second, ifdecisions about disposals for cannabis offencesare contingent on previous (cannabis) disposals,as suggested by the new 2006 ACPO guidelines,considerations of equity and consistency requireforces to have accurate recording procedures.

In light of the introduction of the SOCaP,individual forces should be encouraged toreview their current recording systems forcannabis offences. This will determine whethertheir administrative procedures have thecapacity to accurately record arrests and streetwarnings, and provide accessible data on theoffender, his/her demographics, the officer inthe case and the final disposal. While this

information may seem basic, none of our sitesheld such information in one place. In each siteseveral different datasets, some of which wereelectronic and some of which were paper, had tobe retrieved, interpreted and gathered onto onedataset before any analysis could take place. Ittook two researchers an average of four weeks,working full time, to complete this task for a 12-month period for one BCU. Few forces will havethe resources to monitor arrests and streetwarnings if data collection has to be done in thesame way that we had to.

Towards the end of our fieldwork the seniorcommand team in one of the sites introduced acannabis (street) warning pro forma that officershad to fill out when they issued a streetwarning. To ensure the data were included onthe appropriate intelligence systems the formswere passed to civilian support staff for dataentry. This simple but effective process freed upofficer time, provided a consistent approach andensured all sanction detections were recorded.

Effective recording and monitoringprocedures are a prerequisite for monitoringhow the system of street warnings is beingimplemented. It is important to ensure no onedemographic or ethnic group is arrested orstreet warned disproportionately. If theresponsibility to enter street warnings is left toindividual officers, forces must ensure they areaware of the correct procedures to follow.Equally, if offenders are to value the currency ofa street warning, both officers and policeoperators must be fully aware whichintelligence system will provide them with thenecessary information to carry out their jobaccurately and professionally.

49


An effective communications strategy

In early 2004, the Government embarked on anextensive and costly communication strategy toinform the public about reclassification. At thesame time, ACPO embarked on an equallyextensive campaign, for both officers and thewider community. But, as we discussed inChapter 2, the messages they both tried toconvey were fully understood only by a smallminority of people. While much of the mediacoverage was inaccurate, it can only partlyexplain why so many members of the publicand a significant minority of serving officerswere confused about reclassification and what itmeant. In reality, confusion was probably theresult of a combination of a number of factorsincluding:

• a protracted parliamentary debate

• the complicated government compromise,retaining the power of arrest

• inaccurate media coverage.

At the time of writing, the Advisory Councilon the Misuse of Drugs had recently submittedits report (ACMD, 2006) to the previous HomeSecretary, Charles Clarke, on the evidence aboutlinks between cannabis use and mental health.The Council urged the Government to develop asustained public education and informationstrategy about the risks of cannabis. Wheninforming the House of Commons about hisintention to leave cannabis as a Class C drug,Charles Clarke emphasised the need for a clearand concise communication strategy with whichto inform the general public about cannabis. Hestated:

… it is the case that clarity is the best weapon wehave in the fight to reduce the use of cannabis …Everyone needs to understand that cannabis isharmful and illegal. Our education and healthcampaigns will clearly transmit that message.(Hansard, 19 January 2006, col. 983)

For any information campaign to be effectiveit needs to reach a diverse audience and provideinstant impact. It is clear from the lastinformation drive that, to achieve this aim, theGovernment needs to devise new andinnovative approaches. Coupled with theGovernment’s drugs information websiteFRANK, radio and newspaper adverts wereeffective at reaching some young people. Hard-to-reach groups – in particular those likely tocome into contact with the police, those unlikelyto have access to the internet, those who havedifficulty reading and those who do not want tolisten to a government information bulletin –will need to be captured in other ways.Alternative forms of communication couldinclude sending text information to youngpeople’s mobile phones and placingreclassification literature in alternative retailestablishments that sell clothes, CDs and DVDs.Professionals working with young people –including detached youth outreach workers,youth offending team (YOT) workers, healthworkers/visitors, teachers and staff at youngoffender institutions – could also be encouragedto provide them with information. While we areunqualified to state what information youngpeople and the general public should receive,we can highlight that, in light of the widespreadconfusion caused by the initial campaign,whatever information is provided must be easyto understand and easier still to remember.

50


The impact of the Serious Organised Crime

and Police Act 2005

This report has described the somewhattortuous journey of cannabis from a Class B to aClass C drug. One of the biggest ironies of theprocess is that the main rationale forreclassification was removed by SOCaP. TheIndependent Inquiry’s call for reclassificationwas quite largely premised on the idea that, ifcannabis was a Class C drug, possessionoffences would fall below the threshold of‘arrestability’, as the maximum penalty wouldfall to two years (Police Foundation, 2000).4

SOCaP has removed the distinction betweenoffences that are arrestable and those that arenot. Instead, as described in Chapter 1, alloffences are arrestable, provided that thearresting officer can demonstrate that the arrestis necessary and proportionate to thecircumstances.

The Government argued that the changes toarrest powers were simply a rationalisation oflegislation that had become overly complicatedand that, in any case, needed to be drawn moreclosely in line with the Human Rights Act 1998.In other words, its impact on police powers wasintended to be neutral. Critics have argued thata power of arrest on a case-by-case basisinvolves an extension of police discretion, andthus an extension of their powers (Home Office,2005c).

The precise impact of SOCaP on day-to-daypolice practice in relation to minor offencesremains to be seen, and will depend on how thecourts interpret the legislation. If and when anytest cases on arrests for cannabis possession

come before the courts, rulings against thepolice could effectively bring about what theIndependent Inquiry hoped to achieve inrecommending reclassification in 2000.However, rulings that place a less restrictiveinterpretation on Section 110 of SOCaP couldmean that the police retain the fairly unfetteredpowers that they have had for many years toarrest for cannabis possession.

The future

This chapter has offered a number ofsuggestions and recommendations about thepolicing of cannabis. By way of conclusion, wewill sketch out three principles that we believeshould underpin future policy on cannabispolicing. First, it is essential that police policiesand procedures for dealing with cannabisoffences are routinely monitored by forces, andexposed to some independent scrutiny andmonitoring – for example, by police authorities.Second – a related issue – if cannabis policing isto be seen as equitable and fair, and the criminaljustice system as open and transparent, it iscritical that the policing of black and minorityethnic groups is non-discriminatory, adequatelymonitored and critically evaluated at regularintervals. Finally, it is essential to monitorclosely how systems for performancemanagement affect the policing of cannabis. Thesetting of policing targets can lead to realimprovements in policing – but, where pursuedmechanically and thoughtlessly, they can alsodamage relations between police and public,and erode policing legitimacy.

51

Chapter 1

1 These figures are likely to be underestimates,reflecting both sampling and response bias.

2 Home Office vulnerable groups include:school truants, excludees, those ‘looked after’by local authorities or in foster care, homelesspeople, young people from substance-misusing families and young offenders.

3 The Home Office has revised upwards itsfigures for cautions and convictions that wepublished in May et al. (2002), and we haveused the revised figures here. It should benoted that statistics on street warnings inFigure 1 cover nine rather than 12 months.

4 With a few exceptions, offences with amaximum sentence of two years are non-arrestable. Possession of a Class C drugcarries a two-year maximum sentence.

5 Cannabis oil (previously a Class A drug),which was originally deemed a more harmfulform of the drug, herbal cannabis andcannabis resin (previously Class B drugs),have all been reclassified as Class C drugs.

6 The term ‘formal warning’ was also used inthe Home Office report on Crime in Englandand Wales 2005/06 (Walker et al., 2006).

7 In this report, we will continue to use theterm ‘street warning’ to refer to the warningissued to those found by a police officer inpossession of a small amount of cannabis.The term was introduced by the LabourGovernment in January 2004. At the time ofthe research, this was still the ‘correct’ term.

8 During our observations this team had beenexpanded to 12 officers, with other officershaving been seconded from the responseteams.

9 The resource demands of the traditionalpolicing model had been subject to a far-reaching review at district and force level.Because the current model led to officersgetting ‘tied up’ with incidents thatprevented them remaining on patrol, theforce structure was soon to be overhauled.Shifts were being split into response andenquiry teams. The idea was that responseteams would deal with incidents and makearrests, but the paperwork and processingelement of the case would be handled by anenquiry team, thus allowing response officersto remain on patrol and attend otherincidents.

Chapter 2

1 It has recently been estimated that, in 2004, 52per cent of households had direct access tothe internet (ONS, 2001).

Chapter 3

1 Disposing of illicit drugs informally wouldprobably contravene force regulations. It isfor this reason that informal warnings forcannabis possession have gone largelyunnoticed. Other informal warnings willoften be recorded in pocket books.

2 Other disposals included: bailed, no furtheraction, sectioned under the Mental HealthAct, transferred to another station and notrecorded.

Notes

52


3 In arriving at this decision we used fourvariables to determine whether the arresteewas the same individual on both occasions.These were surname, age, ethnicity and areaarrested.

4 For the purpose of this research we includedthe following arrestable offences in ouranalysis: supplying a Class A drug (includingpossession with intent, intent to supply andconspiracy); robbery; burglary; raciallyaggravated offences; murder, includingattempt; grievous bodily harm; and firearmsoffences.

5 The final two officers stated that they wereunsure of what they would do.

Chapter 4

1 We have not used the 2004/05 Home Officerecorded street warnings (40,138) figure, asthe comparable caution and convictionstatistics were unavailable at the time ofwriting.

2 Individuals’ performance will be judgedagainst their contribution to targets, and adepartment with a poor track record inmeeting PSA targets will be compromised insubsequent treasury negotiations. Policeforces performing poorly on PSA targets canexpect unwelcome intervention from theHome Office.

3 ‘Passive drug dogs’ are trained to approachand sit beside people on whom they cansmell drugs.

4 Contained in this figure will be a very smallproportion of cannabis formal warnings andthose that were summoned to court for theoffence rather than arrested.

Chapter 5

1 Working against this political backdrop wasnot new to us. Our original study, whichexamined the policing of cannabis as a ClassB drug, was conducted at the time when thedecision to reclassify cannabis from a B to a Cdrug was being taken.

2 Any warning that ‘used up’ one of a youngoffender’s chances in avoiding prosecutionwould require more formality than isavailable in a street warning.

3 http://www.kent.police.uk/About%20Kent%20Police/Policy%20Documents/k/k04.html.

4 The Inquiry clearly attached someimportance to the principle that the system ofdrug classification should reflect relativeharm, but the removal of the power of arrestfor possession of cannabis promised to be thesingle most tangible consequence ofreclassification.

53

ACMD (Advisory Council on the Misuse ofDrugs) (2002) The Classification of Cannabis under

the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. London: HomeOffice

ACMD (Advisory Council on the Misuse ofDrugs) (2006) Further Consideration of the

Classification of Cannabis under the Misuse of

Drugs Act 1971. London: Home Office

ACPO (Association of Chief Police Officers)(2003) Cannabis Enforcement Guidance. London:ACPO

ACPO (Association of Chief Police Officers)(2006) Cannabis Enforcement Guidance (draft).London: ACPO

Audit Commission (2004) Youth Justice 2004:

A Review of the Reformed Youth Justice System.

London: Audit Commission

Becker, J. and Roe, S. (2005) Drug Use among

Vulnerable Groups of Young People: Findings from

the 2003 Crime and Justice Survey. Home OfficeResearch Findings 254. London: Home Office

Budd, T., Sharp, C., Weir, G., Wilson, D. andOwen, N. (2005) Young People and Crime:

Findings from the 2004 Offending, Crime and

Justice Survey. Home Office Statistical Bulletin20/05. London: Home Office

Clancy, A., Hough, M., Aust, R. and Kershaw, C.(2001) Crime Policing and Justice: The Experience of

Ethnic Minorities. Findings from the 2000 British

Crime Survey. Home Office Research Study No.223. London: Home Office

Daily Mail (2002) ‘Has Blunkett made a hash ofit?’, 12 July

Daily Mail (2003) ‘Green light to smoke pot’,12 September

Daily Mirror (2002) ‘Cannabis is Class C in newdope laws’, 10 July

Daily Mirror (2005) ‘Cannabis use soared asLabour softened the law’, 2 March

(The) Daily Telegraph (2001) ‘Cannabis users freefrom arrest’, 31 October

(The) Daily Telegraph (2004) ‘1m campaign toexplain drug laws’, 19 January

Fitzgerald, M. (1999) Final Report into Stop and

Search. London: Metropolitan Police Service

Flood-Page, C., Campbell, S., Harrington, V. andMillar, J. (2000) Youth Crime: Findings from the

1998/99 Youth Lifestyles Survey. Home OfficeResearch Study 209. London: Home Office

Fortson, R. (2006) Misuse of Drugs, Offences,

Confiscation and Money Laundering. Andover:Sweet and Maxwell

GMB Union (2005) Workers Rights: Pay Rates and

Conditions. http://www.gmbunionlancs.com/pay_rates_and _conditions.html

Graham, J. and Bowling, B. (1995) Young People

and Crime. Home Office Research Study 145.London: Home Office

(The) Guardian (2001) ‘Easing drug laws winssupport’, 31 October

Hansard (2003) ‘Dangerous drugs’, 29 October,cols 331–6. London: Home Office

Hansard (2006) ‘Regulation of cannabis’,19 January, cols. 983–4. London: Home Office

Home Affairs Select Committee (2002) The

Government’s Drug Policy – Is it Working?

London: Home Office

References

54


Home Office (2002) The Government’s Drug

Policy: Is It Working? The Government Reply to the

Third Report from the Home Affairs Committee.London: Home Office

Home Office (2005a) Background to Cannabis

Reclassification. http://www.drugs.gov.uk/drugs-laws/cannabis-reclassifications/background?version=1

Home Office (2005b) SR2002 Public Service

Agreement Technical Notes Updated July 2005.London: Home Office. http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/psa-technical-note-SR02-jul-05?view=Binary

Home Office (2005c) Policing: Modernising Police

Powers to Meet Community Needs. Summary of

Responses. London: Home Office

ICM (2001) ‘Crime survey’, prepared for BBCOnline by ICM Research Limited

LVQ Research (2004) Tracking the Effectiveness of

Advertising/Publicity for Re-classifying Cannabis

from a Class B to Class C Drug. London: COICommunications

Mail on Sunday (2005) ‘Don’t let our dope-friendly politicians dupe us again’, 20 March

May, T., Warburton, H., Turnbull, P.J. andHough, M. (2002) Times they are A-changing:

Policing of Cannabis. York: Joseph RowntreeFoundation

Metropolitan Police Authority (2002) The

Lambeth Cannabis Warning Pilot Scheme. London:Metropolitan Police Authority

Miller, P. and Plant, M. (1996) ‘Drinking,smoking and illicit drug use among 15 and 16year olds in the United Kingdom’, British

Medical Journal, Vol. 313, pp. 394–7

MORI (2002a) Policing the Possession of Cannabis:

Residents’ Views on the Lambeth Experiment.

London: Police Foundation

MORI (2002b) Youth Survey 2002. London: YouthJustice Board

MORI (2004) MORI Youth Survey 2004. London:Youth Justice Board

Mwenda, L. (2005) Drug Offenders in England and

Wales 2004. Home Office Statistical Bulletin 23/05. London: Home Office

NCSR/NFER (National Centre for SocialResearch/National Foundation for EducationalResearch) (2006) Drug Use, Smoking and Drinking

among Young People in England in 2005: Headline

Figures. Leeds: Health and Social CareInformation Centre

Newcombe, R. (1999) ‘The people on drugs:British attitudes to drug laws and policy’,Druglink, July/August, pp. 12–15

Ogilvie, D., Gruer, L. and Haw, S. (2005) ‘Youngpeople’s access to tobacco, alcohol, and otherdrugs’, British Medical Journal, Vol. 331,pp. 393–6

ONS (Office for National Statistics) (2001) 2001

Census, Online Report. www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001

Parker, H., Aldridge, J. and Measham, F. (1998)Illegal Leisure: The Normalisation of Adolescent

Recreational Drug Use. London: Routledge

55

References

Pearson, G. and Shiner, M. (2002) ‘Rethinkingthe generation gap: attitudes to illicit drugsamong young people and adults’, Criminal

Justice, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 71–86

Police Foundation (2000) Drugs and the Law:

Report of the Independent Inquiry into the Misuse of

Drugs Act 1971. London: Police Foundation

Roe, S. and Man, L. (2006) Drug Misuse Declared:

Findings from the 2005/06 British Crime Survey.Home Office Statistical Bulletin 15/06. London:Home Office

(The) Sunday Times (2002) ‘Cannabis to be“legalised” in a year’, 30 June

Walker, A., Kershaw, C. and Nicholas, S. (2006)Crime in England and Wales 2005/06. Home OfficeStatistical Bulletin 12/06. London: Home Office

Warburton, H., May, T. and Hough, M. (2005)‘Looking the other way: the impact ofreclassifying cannabis on police warnings,arrests and informal action in England andWales’, British Journal of Criminology, Vol. 45,No. 2, pp. 113–28