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"Election 2005"

I have made up my mind, after years of being Liberal I am going to vote Labour at the elections next Thursday. Reason are way to many to list but in short, since Labour took over I have bought my own home, we have a good life style we want for little and in general for me at least every thing is tickety Boo just now.

We agreed to disagree in our last debate. Doesn't mean I'm going to sit back and watch whilst you make "nyuhhhhh" statements.

You initially said;

"If Lib Dems get into power it would mean anyone caught dealing smack or crack won't get banged up!"

Now you're saying

"Well as it states in there own manifesto that they'd rather concentrate police efforts on tackling drug trafickers and those drug dealers who resort to crime to feed there habits, rather than criminalising possesing canabis for there own personal smoke."

So no, it wouldn't put "people dealing smack and crack" in that category. In fact, it's considerably different, isn't it? It implies someone dealing cannabis to support their own cannabis habit, does it not? At the very most, you could say it's not 100% clear. Which is STILL quite a long way from "Libdems = any smack and crack dealers will be let off", isn't it?

You got your info from GMTV? Wow...a well known source of hard-edged journalistic reporting. You looked at the other websites? Based on our last debate, I'll be surprised if you looked at them in any detail.

You did exactly what you did in the last debate; you saw what you wanted to see, and looked only for evidence that backed up that assumption



[Edit] This seems to be a slightly differently worded version to what Sheepy just said...

[URL]http://www.libdems.org.uk/media/documents/policies/LawandOrder.pdf[/URL]

If you look at the last page in this link you will see for yourself that it includes any hard drug. I hope that makes you lot happy.

It says for OWNING any hard drugs. NOT for dealing them.


A bit of a difference really, isn't it? Or are you of the opinion that addicts should be punished? Should the police spend their time chasing addicts instead of the dealers.

Ok so it says owning hard drugs, there is a difference, yes. All a dealer has to do though is keep his stuff in a lump or in one bag uncut, and if he gets raided, he just has to claim it was his personal. Thats not going to distinguish the dealers from the users unless they get caught red handed which is very unlikely. Dealers are not stupid, they know the law better than most people and know where a system can be exploited, and this has that writen all over it.

If you look at the right hand side of the 7th page you'll see a new offence of 'dealing', aiming at punishing dealers rather than the user. Making your intial statements rubbish.

Oh how terrible they are... introducing ways of trying to help drug addicts rather than throw them in cells and let them climb up the walls.

kevstar wrote:
> kevstar wrote:
> [URL]http://www.libdems.org.uk/media/documents/policies/LawandOrder.pdf[/URL]
>
> If you look at the last page in this link you will see for yourself
> that it includes any hard drug. I hope that makes you lot happy.

"Ending the use of imprisonment
as a punishment for possession
for own use of illegal drugs of
any class. Instead, non-custodial
sentences such as community
sentences and Drug Treatment
and Testing Orders could be used.
ReclassiÞ cation would allow for
a more credible education-based
approach to deterring users."

kevstar, there is no shame in admitting "y'know what? I got it wrong."

It beats the hell out of continuing to insist you're right, when the very document you've used to prove it actually shows that you're completely incorrect.

If I had my way I would have it in my manifesto to build more prisons! How would I pay for it? Drug money siezed in raids.

So can we take it that's your own evasive way of saying "Ah...sorry. I got it wrong"?

Wrong yes, and i've never been afraid to admit it, but the points still remain. This policy stinks!