Despite a petition calling for the Government to legalise cannabis, and a study showing the drug is less deadly than alcohol, the Home Office is issuing "no comment" on the matter.

Last week, the parliamentary petition reached more than 200,000 signatures, meaning it would be considered for debate in the House of Commons.

At that time, the Home Office issued a crushing response claiming that "substantial scientific evidence shows cannabis is a harmful drug that can damage human health".

A PARAPLEGIC man’s request to prove to Health officials that cannabis is a better painkiller than conventional pharmaceuticals ‘would never be accepted’, the Health Minister has said.

Health Minister Andrew Green has responded after 28-year-old Islander Daniel Clark, who is wheelchair bound following a motorbike accident ten years ago, offered to prove to doctors that cannabis was better at alleviating his pain than prescription drugs.

Mr Clark, who says his pain is so severe he has considered selling his home and moving to a place where the class B drug is legal, has twice offered to be admitted to hospital for a two-week period in which he would spend a week using cannabis and a week on pharmaceutical painkillers.

A few weeks ago, a parliamentary petition calling for the government to ’make the production, sale and use of cannabis legal’ attracted over 200,000 signatures from the public, meaning it would be considered for debate in the House of Commons and causing many to hope that an issue overhauling laws around the world might finally be discussed properly and sensibly in the UK.

The Home Office issued a crushing response however, claiming that “substantial scientific evidence shows cannabis is a harmful drug that can damage human health,” and dismissing the idea that the legalisation of the drug would bring huge tax benefits and a reduction in crime from its illicit trade.

Doctors in Britain have noticed a significant rise in patients suffering from cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome (CHS), a widely “unrecognized” condition that makes heavy cannabis users severely ill.

Alarming symptoms of the illness include severe stomach pains, vomiting and nausea. 

Those diagnosed with the rare syndrome have to bath nearly five times a day in hot water just to ease their pain.

There have been two known occurrences of the condition in the UK involving patients who visited accident and emergency services multiple times, while cases worldwide are “increasing acutely.”

Professor of gastroenterology at Birmingham City University, Dr Sauid Ishaq, warned the condition must be taken more seriously.

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If smoking a joint is like drinking a pint of beer, doing a dab of concentrated cannabis oil is like necking a quarter pint of vodka. Time for the inevitable tabloid panic?

As soon as they find out what it is, the tabloids are going to freak out about dabbing. This new technique for getting stoned involves young people heating a pinhead’s worth of super-concentrated cannabis oil with a blowtorch, then inhaling it through a glass pipe. For detractors, it’s known as “cannabis crack”.

A NORTH-EAST pensioner dying from liver cancer is begging the authorities to legalise cannabis.

Days after the Government issued a damning response to campaigners, a terminally ill woman has backed growing calls to decriminalise the class-B drug.

In response to a pro-legalisation petition with more than 200,000 signatures, the government issued a statement earlier this week outlining the alleged dangers of cannabis use, saying legalisation would “send the wrong message”.

The pensioner, who does not wish to be identified, has criticised the Government’s stance, saying the opposition is hypocritical given the fact they allow pharmaceutical companies in the UK to harvest the plants.

A PARAPLEGIC man who is calling for the right to be able to take cannabis for medicinal purposes says he is considering selling his home to move to a place where the drug is legal.

Daniel Clark, who has been paralysed from the waist down since a motorbike accident ten years ago, said that his quality of life is worsening by the day because, he claim's the ‘man-made drugs’ he is prescribed do not work.

The 28-year-old said he used to be able to go to the gym to keep fit and socialise, but he is in so much pain now that he can no longer do so. He added that last year he took an overdose of his prescription drugs because he could no longer handle the pain.

‘My quality of life is going down,’ he said. ‘My pain is getting worse and I am depressed.’

In the Strait of Gibraltar (Spain) (AFP) - As the powerful motors of their speedboat roared, Spanish police used a thermal imaging camera to scan the sea in the Strait of Gibraltar for traffickers smuggling hashish from Morocco.

It's just after midnight and the cameras and radars that monitor the coast detect a dodgy-looking boat.

The control centre informs police in Algeciras, a port city in southern Spain just 90 minutes by ferry from Morocco, and three officers immediately jump into the boat to investigate.

"They are likely looking for a place to unload their merchandise," said one of them, Jesus, who declined to give his last name.