Conservative candidate Richard Graham has said that legalising cannabis would be bad for mental health and increases risks to school pupils.
Last week during Mental Health Awareness Week Theresa May confirmed that we have invested more in mental health than ever before, with an estimated £11.7 billion a year spent on mental health, and pledged to employ 10,000 more mental health professionals in the NHS by 2020. The Prime Minister also pledged that every primary and secondary school in England and Wales will have staff trained in mental health first aid. Meanwhile the Lib Dems have pledged to liberalise smoking cannabis for everyone over the age of 18.
Richard said, “the contrast is striking: Conservatives doing more to help with growing mental health issues, especially among the young, which can be made worse by social media pressures, and the Lib Dems propose something which mental health charities have repeatedly said would increase mental health issues.”
Richard added, “there would also be a social pressure risk to under age pupils in the company of over 18s to join in. I do not believe that legalising cannabis is going to help solve our growing drugs problem in Gloucester or elsewhere in the country.”