Shock call to legalise cocaine

A London MP today sparked a new row over Britain's drug laws with a startling call for cocaine to be legalised and sold over the counter.

Liberal Democrat Jenny Tonge also said heroin should be made more widely available on the NHS so addicts could be treated and not left to commit crimes to feed their habit.

Ms Tonge, MP for Richmond Park and her party's international development spokesman, went far further than official Lib-Dem policy of legalising cannabis and ending jail sentences for personal users of all other drugs.

She claimed Britain's drug laws were "not working" and needed an overhaul - even if this led to more addicts. Cocaine, which caused 87 deaths in 1999, should be sold over the counter in the same way alcohol and tobacco is now, Ms Tonge suggested.

She said: "I think cocaine is a difficult one, but I would agree with a lot of people that you would do less damage if cocaine was actually legalised and sold at registered outlets like alcohol than leaving it to the boys on the streets."

Ms Tonge used an interview with BBC Online to go on to claim that cannabis laws were a "complete joke", adding: "That should be used like tobacco, taxed like tobacco and let's spend the VAT on something."

She admitted there would still be a black market for drugs if more were legalised - but pointed out that this was also the case with tobacco and alcohol. She added: "It would be surely less. And there will be no excuse at all for an addict having to commit crimes to feed their habit."

VOTE: Legalise cocaine?