Sajid Javid should follow evidence, not ideology, when it comes to drug crime

The US government’s ‘war on drugs’ has done nothing to reduce rates of substance use in America – and neither will the home secretary’s policy in the UK

The last time a senior Tory announced a crackdown on middle class drug use at a Conservative Party conference it turned into a rather bad trip.

Eighteen years ago the shadow home secretary Ann Widdecombe proposed £100 fixed penalties for anyone caught possessing “just one joint” of cannabis. “No more getting away with just a caution, no more hoping that a blind eye will be turned,” she thundered to delegates in Bournemouth. “Parents want it. Schools need it. Our future demands it. The next Conservative government will do it.”

But it turned out her colleagues weren’t so keen. Eight shadow cabinet ministers subsequently cheerfully relayed to newspapers that they’d smoked marijuana while at university, leaving Widdecombe’s policy and her political credibility looking more wrecked than Hunter S Thompson’s hotel room.