ebeneezer

Mind you, he's played live all through his 60s so I think he'll do alright. He's a tough old cookie.

I don't think I do. But you can't just look at the behaviour of 18-24 year olds and extrapolate it to fit the general population. Even among young people, I doubt if the overwhelming majority (or even the majority) are into regular drug use. There's a lot of young blokes play fitba and other sports for a start. No way are they out getting coked up, speeding or weeding or whatever terminology you want to use. Illegal drugs are an underground activity. Let's keep them there. Besides, didn't they try and legalise hash in Brixton, only for heroin dealers to flood the area. A similar situation can be observed along the Dutch-German border.

It does make them more reliable if they are going to turn up every day not still half out of their head. Never seen a Pole puffing on a joint come to think of it. Most European immigrants are here because they want to get on in life, not hide from it via drug taking. Mind you, I still think claims like "90 percent of my mates smoke weed all the time, take coke every weekend etc" are wildly exagerrated, or at least it's just focussed on one small area of society. Most people do just stick to a drink now and again.

That must mean people are turning up for work half wasted from the night before. And we wonder why employers are increasingly favouring eastern Europeans.

I'd rather have a nice ale and keep my marbles.

Can't say I know anyone who does weed or coke. 20 years ago aye, but not in your 40s for Christ's sake. A bunch of middle aged blokes huddled round a hash bong and laughing at the patterns on the wallpaper is just a bizarre image in my eyes.

I wouldn't say drug taking is the norm for people in the UK. How many people outside the 15-25 age group are indulging? When you're young and have no real responsibilities, it's normal to experiment with this and that but once things like mortgages, marriages, kids and careers enter the equation, people tend to move on in life. I guess dope smokers put forward this "loads of people do it" line to justify their own actions but, in reality, most people aren't taking illegal drugs of any sort.

Any moves to normalise a druggy culture is a dangerous road to go down.

What's all this talk about grams? Have the weights & measures polis finally caught up with dope dealers?

I'm a wee bit concerned about the side effects of weed. They say it damages the lungs, impairs short-term memory and damages the lungs.

I'm sure if alcohol and tobacco had been discovered in modern times, they would also have been proscribed. But these substances have been widely consumed publically for centuries whereas dope smoking only became known to the general population in relatively recent times. As for cannabis not causing physical harm, surely if you piped pure marijuana every day for 30 years it woud seriously affect your heart and lungs?

But is it a fair comparison? The alcoholic has been abusing his chosen substance in an extreme fashion whereas it sounds as if the other guy hasn't hit the cannabis quite as hard.

At least they'll come out the nick fluent in Spanish.

Providing easier access to alcohol, tobacco and gambling increases consumption of these products. Weed would follow the same trend if it were legalised.

If you were organising an international drugs run, would you take a chance on a couple of wee lassies who might squeal to the polis? Surely there are people who would willingly take on the task for the usual fee.