There’s only one city in the UK where smoking weed won’t get you prosecuted
Police in this city have a very different stance when it comes to marijuana compared to the rest of the country
The topic of marijuana has made headlines around the world this week after it was reported that United States President Donald Trump is looking at reclassifying the drug.
An article published by the Wall Street Journal reports that the 79-year-old Republican is currently 'looking at' making a huge change, which would make it easier to buy and sell weed, making the multibillion-dollar industry more profitable.
Speaking at a recent fundraiser held at his New Jersey golf club, Trump allegedly said he was considering changing the classification of marijuana from a Schedule I controlled substance to a Schedule III substance.
Without waffling on with too much political jargon, this basically means that it wouldn't make the drug completely legal across the US, but it would help ease restrictions on it.
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But what are the laws like concerning marijuana across the pond in the United Kingdom? Well, you'll be interested to know that there's actually only one city in the UK where smoking weed won’t get you prosecuted.
No matter where you are in the world, unless maybe Amsterdam or other more lenient countries, it's clear that cannabis and the legality surrounding it have long been debated.
At the moment, in the UK, weed is still a Class B drug. However, if you are caught with it in your possession, you could be looking at a sentence of five years or less.
Decriminalisation efforts have been going strong now for decades, and while it hasn't happened nationwide just yet, there is one place in England where police have a different stance when it comes to huffing on the devil's lettuce.
And that's Durham, of all places.
Things changed back in 2015 when the then-Durham police crime commissioner, Ron Hogg, decided the police should take a new approach and no longer actively pursue weed smokers or small-scale growers.
Hogg outlined that he was keen on officers spending more time and resources on serious crimes, pointing out that the police would be better off going after dealers than users.
However, don't be under the impression that you can pack up shop and move to Durham to grow your own cannabis plants or walk about town toking on a joint without getting in trouble, as smoking weed is still as illegal in Durham as it is in the rest of the UK.
A spokesman for Durham Constabulary told Tyla: "Cannabis is an illegal drug and anyone caught smoking it in public in County Durham and Darlington can expect to face action by our officers.
"However, our attention is focused less on low-level users and more on disrupting the activities of those organised criminal gangs which profit from the supply of drugs and those dealers who harm our communities."
Rhiannon Ingle