United Kingdom: a think tank calls for a digital cannabis market

A report signed by the pro-drug-regulation think tank Volte Face, explains that a controlled cannabis market would offer safer products and the possibility of taxing revenues, estimated at 800 million pounds (940 million euros). The UK could, they argue, develop a digital-only cannabis market, to reduce black market revenues.

The regulated market would restrict access to people of more than 21 years, with similar checks to those already in place for buying alcohol online.

«We believe that the UK's multi-million pound cannabis market should be developed and operated solely online by a private sector strictly controlled and regulated by democratically elected governments,» reads the report entitled. The Green Screen.

The anti-drug activists called this suggestion 'an opportunity for national disaster» and »surely the most irresponsible thing to do«.

Some 21 million people consume cannabis every year in the UK, according to government figures, even though the cannabis is illegal.

Mike Power, author of the report The Green Screen told Sky News: «The way it is now, any young person can come into Camden with £5 or £10 and buy cannabis. They can't go into a supermarket and buy alcohol without having their age verified. We think that a digital model would to do the same. So that with every purchase, the person's age and ID would be checked. And also, it would mean taxing every purchase, tracking them and making sure the money goes straight into the taxpayer's pocket.»

For Volte Face, the possibility of a cannabis market online-only would avoid the objections to Dutch coffeeshops or the utra-liberalism of some American states like Colorado. Digital platforms already exist, for example on the dark web, and the model would be easy to reproduce.

This denial of a physical market is not shared by all the report's supporters, such as Transform's Steve Rolles.

In a interview for Vice, Mike Power goes into more detail about the eventual digital platform: no branding, no discounts or special 4/20 promotions, just prices, weed names, potency and effects.

This would also mean that support for the customer's choice, or for the customer's patient in need is limited.