What is the State of Marijuana in the UK?

Marijuana is currently illegal for recreational use in the United Kingdom. However, medical marijuana was legalised in 2018. The UK’s legal stances on medical and recreational cannabis apply to all the countries in the Union, including England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

While the medical use of cannabis is legal in the UK, it is only approved for a select few medical conditions and its availability through the NHS is limited. Calls to legalise marijuana for recreational use are growing, especially with more countries in Europe legalising adult-use cannabis. However, the UK government of the day refused to debate the issue and confirmed no intention of removing cannabis from the UK list of Class B drugs.

How Has Marijuana Affected the Economy of the UK?

Although recreational marijuana is illegal in the UK, the Union is arguably the biggest producer and exporter of cannabis intended for medicinal and scientific uses. The UK is home to a number of pharmaceutical and biotech companies licensed to grow marijuana and extract cannabis oil and cannabinoids. Jazz Pharmaceuticals, located in London, Oxford, and Cambridge, manufactures Sativex and Epidiolex, two of the most popular medicinal cannabis drugs available. Epidiolex contains cannabidiol and is used to treat certain forms of epileptic seizures while Sativex contains Delta-9 THC, a cannabis compound useful for treating neuropathic pain.

While a 2023 House of Commons Report on the economic impact of medicinal cannabis acknowledged that there are no official estimates of the size of the UK medicinal cannabis industry, it mentioned the production capacity of this industry. In 2021, the UK harvested 59 hectares of cannabis to produce 329 tonnes of marijuana for medical and scientific purposes. Out of these, 213 tonnes were exported, a figure that represents more than half of the global medical cannabis export for the year. Clearly, this high annual output would directly produce significant tax revenues for the UK as well as keep thousands of individuals employed.

The potential size of the UK’s marijuana market is huge, with the cannabis black market valued at £2.6 billion in 2019. If legalised, the UK can easily turn the clear and growing public demand for cannabis into a boon to boost its economy. Making cannabis fully legal is also expected to raise employment, lower government spending on policing marijuana crimes, and make UK cities more attractive tourist destinations.

What is the Marijuana Crime Rate in the UK?

Cannabis crime rate in the UK is reported on a country-by-country basis. However, the overall trend is the same in the countries making up the UK. A snapshot of the UK’s marijuana crime rate is captured in the 2021 House of Commons Report detailing drug crime figures in England and Wales. The report confirmed that cannabis possession is the most common drug crime in the UK. In the 2020/2021 reporting period, it accounted for 63% of all drug crimes in England and Wales. In the same period, possession of other controlled drugs accounted for 18% of all drug offences. Compared to the previous year, cannabis possession offences rose by 21.5%.

Most possession of cannabis incidents reported in the UK are resolved with out-of-court disposals such as cautions and PNDs (penalty notices for disorders). Generally, in the UK, a PND for cannabis possession results in an on-the-spot fine of £90. In the 2020/2021 year under review, cannabis possession was the second most common offence for PNDs in England and Wales, after drunk and disorderly.

The Home Office’s report on the rate of drug seizures for the 2021 financial year also revealed that cannabis was the most commonly seized drug in England and Wales. It accounted for 95% of Class B drugs seized and 71% of all drug seizures. The most common form of cannabis seized during this period was herbal cannabis. The rate of herbal cannabis seizure rose by 21% compared to the previous year even though the amount seized reduced by 16%.

What is the History of Marijuana in the UK?

The first reported use of marijuana for medicinal purposes in the UK was in 1842 when William Brooke O’Shaughnessy, an Irish medical officer, brought it with him from Bengal. Prior to this, recreational and medical cannabis use were commonly reported in different parts of the British Empire. Just as its use got to the heart of the empire later than the colonies, cannabis was prohibited in these places before it was banned in the United Kingdom. It was not until 1928 that cannabis prohibition became law in the UK, with the addition of the drug to the Dangerous Drugs Act 1920.

The Misuse of Drugs Act of 1971 established classes of controlled substances in the UK and placed cannabis in Class B, the second-highest category. Between then and the rest of the century, cannabis use and arrest slowly climbed in the UK. Cannabis crimes were regarded as serious offences in the countries of the UK until 2004 when the UK government reclassified the drug as a Class C substance. This downgrade was recommended by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) and resulted in less severe penalties for offenders. However, the decriminalisation of cannabis was short-lived. The next UK government promptly reinstated cannabis to a Class B categorisation in 2008 and stepped up the policing of cannabis-related crimes.

It was not until 2018 that medical cannabis was legalised in the UK. This change did not happen without a national controversy. The public outcry following reports of the National Health Service (NHS) denying cannabis medications to two kids living with epilepsy forced the government to grant authorisation for medical marijuana for certain groups of patients. However, the UK’s medical cannabis program only provides limited availability to medicinal marijuana. In addition to allowing only a select few conditions, the law only allows doctors on the Specialist Register of the General Medical Council to recommend medical cannabis. Lastly, the NHS and NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) provides very limited guidance to healthcare professionals and the public. It is no wonder then that patients who would have benefitted from medical cannabis use do not know they are qualified to receive it or have no access to cannabis medications.

With the increasing calls for the legalisation of recreational cannabis and expansion of the medical cannabis program, it is likely that cannabis will be fully legal in the UK in the near future. This legislation is, however, unlikely to happen without a change in government and a very strong public support for making cannabis widely available and easily accessible.