He was right to resign. What was wrong was the timing - he should have resigned before making his private opinions publicly known and not after.

It’s clear that, even where the science is not in question, policy is almost never determined by science alone - if it were there would be no need for politicians! There are always other factors to consider.

Plus, Prof Nutt also appears not to have noticed, or perhaps doesn’t care, that in matters of public health, variable, inconclusive, or disputed advice is usually worse than no advice at all. In his particular area, government and advisors should take care to sing from one hymn sheet.

Heading an advisory panel gives one a privileged line of communication into the cabinet. As always, with privilege comes obligation - in this case, the obligation to keep one’s mouth closed until after one has resigned.

As Churchill famously said : “Experts should be on tap, not on top.” Prof. Nutt , by speaking out against the government, has forgotten his position as being ‘on tap’ and the government were absolutely right to sack him. Who cares if his ‘other colleagues’ go as well? What a petty threat that is. As A.Nomynous says above, you need people who understand the basic chemistry of drugs in this kind of job, and as Prof. Nutt obviously doesn’t or chooses to ignore the known negative sides of the chemistry for political reasons, he is wholly unsuitable for the position anyway. Good Riddance. The facts remain: despite what pop stars, liberal politicians and politically-motivated professors tell you, cannabis is harmful. Everyone I ever knew from school and college who were regular users underwent a permanent personality change over the years as well as their facial features changing permanently to that classic ‘washed out’ look. They are now all paranoid and negative about life. And as for ‘harmless to other people’ - I could be rendered dangerous to drive from breathing in somebody else’s cannabis smoke if it were ever legalized/decriminalized like in the Netherlands - you cannot make another driver ‘over the top’ from passive drinking like you could from passive smoking - so in this one respect at least, alcohol is far safer than cannabis. Incompetent on the subject, and speaking above his paymasters - two very good reasons to dump this fool.

Jon H.

‘Getting old’ is not the same as being too nervous or paranoid to answer the phone, getting regular panic attacks, lacking the motivation to get out of bed in the morning, permanent fatigue, confusion, depression, loss of short term memory and ermm.. loss of short term memory. I don’t think that cannabis causes fatalities, I think it wrecks lives - which is worse? I disagree that it is less harmful than tobacco - people can still function normally after smoking tobacco. But yes it may be less harmful than drinking alcohol, except that there is an acceptance amongst young people of people getting up and smoking cannabis all day long - if people were to do the same with alcohol people would immediately recognise that they had a problem.
It’s also related to smoking tobacco; cannabis smokers are often addicted to ’spliffs’ which are a combination of cannabis and tobacco - if you decide to give up one but not the other and then someone offers you a spliff at a party it’s very easy to fall back into smoking both.
I just feel that ‘experts’ and politicians are not in tune with what cannabis does and how to deal with the problem or even recognise that there is a problem. If the government wants advice on how to deal with drugs, it should consult a range of experts, including the long term users.