An MP has urged people to use cannabis at the Houses of Parliament in order to send a message about drugs policy to the Government.

Labour's Paul Flynn said using the Class B substance at the Palace of Westminster was the "only way we can get through the common mind of the Government".

Mr Flynn, speaking during a Commons debate about drugs policy, said this would "challenge the Government" and authorities to "arrest them and take them in".

The former Labour frontbencher said: "I would call on people, and I know we're not supposed to do this as members, to break the law.

"To come here and use cannabis here and see what happens and challenge the Government, the authorities, to arrest them and take them in.


"That's the only way we can get through the common mind of the Government, which is set in concrete and the whole laws are evidence free and prejudice rich - let's see them do that."

Mr Flynn told the House how a campaigner once drank cannabis tea with him on the House of Commons terrace.

He said he had committed a "terrible crime" with multiple sclerosis sufferer Elizabeth Brice, also known as Clare Hodges, who campaigned for medicinal cannabis to be legalised before her death in 2011.

Mr Flynn said: "She came to this House and together, collaborating with her, we committed a terrible crime on the terrace of this House because I supplied her with a cup of hot water into which she put cannabis and she drank cannabis tea."

Mr Flynn said she was "liable to go to prison for seven years" for doing so, and added: "I probably would have been accompanying her, but I think we have to say to those who put up with the barbaric stupidity and cruelty of Government policy that denies seriously ill people their medicine of choice we've got to call on those who are in this position to act in a way of civil disobedience."