The Liberal Democrat leadership candidate Norman Lamb has called for the UK to legalise, regulate and tax the sale of cannabis.

The former care minister and MP for North Norfolk said the UK should draw on examples from US states such as Colorado, which legalised the possession of small amounts of marijuana for recreational use by over-21s in November 2012.

He said he wanted immediate legalisation of the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes, and said there should be a swift evidence-based policy change in relation to recreational use.

Lamb acknowledged that the legalisation of recreational use would require a UN treaty change, which he said could be secured at the 2016 meeting of the general assembly on the UN’s drug control system.

“There has been a catastrophic failure of the war on drugs, with thousands of lives lost,” Lamb said. Drug laws were “criminalising so many young people, which blights their lives because of a decision about personal use which then affects their careers and creates a global criminal network”.



He added: “As a parent, I have real concerns about the dangers of drugs, both legal and illegal. But I think that it’s much better to take a rational, education-based approach rather than the approach that we take at the moment.”

The Liberal Democrats have historically been supportive of liberalising drug laws. Their general election manifesto this year pledged to allow doctors to prescribe cannabis for medicinal use and to establish a review to assess the effectiveness of legalisation experiments in the US and Uruguay.



Lamb’s only opposition in the leadership race is Tim Farron, the former Lib Dem president and key figure on the left of the party. Farron is thought to be the frontrunner and has secured the formal backing of three of the party’s eight MPs (Mark Williams, John Pugh and Greg Mulholland); the heads of the Scottish and Welsh branches of the Lib Dems, Willie Rennie and Kirsty Williams; the party’s only surviving MEP, Catherine Bearder; and more than 100 former Lib Dem election candidates.



Lamb has been publicly endorsed by Tom Brake, the MP for Carshalton and Wallington, and Shirley Williams, a founding member of the Social Democratic party, which joined with the Liberals to form the Liberal Democrats in 1988.

On Monday, Julian Huppert, a former MP and a campaigner for drug law reform, backed Lamb and his cannabis policy.



“This is not the first time Norman has called for bold changes based on looking at the evidence – he’s done so on mental health, on prison reform and more,” Huppert said. “I think this is exactly the bold leadership we need, and hope people who feel likewise will support Norman.”