Alun Buffry's Blog: 1996: Parole, Howard Marks, Cannabis and Politics, Standing For Parliament, The Challenge

By then(1995) I was going back to Jack’s Yard almost every day, helping him with his campaign to ‘Campaign to Legalise Cannabis International Association’ or ‘CLCIA’, which I had helped found in 1991, whilst on bail. It was now late 1996.

A few months later, I went to a cannabis conference in London and met Howard Marks, who had not long been released from prison in the US. That story is in his book ‘Mr Nice’ where he mentions visiting Norwich to get the passport from Donny Nice. Howard did not mention me in the book, but he did remember meeting me at that garden flat in 1976.

We asked Howard if he would stand for Parliament on the cannabis issue and he said yes, and a whole new episode in my life opened up.

I decided to rent my own place and found a two-bedroomed house in Winter Road, Norwich, thinking that if Howard Marks needed somewhere to stay during his election campaign, he could stay there.

As it happened, he stayed at the Maids Head Hotel when he was in Norwich. I persuaded him to appoint Derek Williams as his election agent, to attempt to seal the rift that had developed between Derek, a campaigner in his own right, and many in the local cannabis campaign community. It was not such a good move as Derek was very anti-tobacco and wanted to make it part of Howard’s campaign, but Howard did not agree. Howard received about 600 votes in each of Norwich South and Norwich North, about 1.6%. He was disappointed but we were pleased. It was at the Hustings at Norwich City College, when Derek asked the panel of candidates who had taken cannabis. Of course Howard said yes, as did the Green Party candidate, Adrian Holmes, but the big surprise was that Labour candidate Charles Clarke also said he had tried it as a student in the US.

Howard Marks. Election campaigns helped bring the issue into the political arena and led to the formation of the first ever UK cannabis-focussed political party in 1999.

Also in 1997, as Melissa, my God-daughter and the daughter of Judi, was now sixteen and wanted to leave home, I rented a room to her at Winter Road

During my stay there, the drugs squad turned up. They climbed through the kitchen window. I heard them coming up the stairs. I was still in bed, reading ‘Trainspotting’. They searched the house. They said that they were there, along with police from the Devon and Cornwall force, because I had been writing to a guy in prison who was inside for cultivating cannabis and he mentioned it is his letters as if he wanted me to grow it. They left disappointed.

Also, whilst I was living in Winter Road, there, Jack and a few others formed what they called UCHASH, the Universal Church of the Holy and Sacred Herb. They held a smoking protest in the cloisters of Norwich Cathedral, telling the Bishop of Norwich in advance, gathered one day on the grass and lit and passed around a chillum, that actually contained lavender. I wasn’t there, but Melissa was, and that evening I saw on TV how the police had hidden around the cloisters, then ‘pounced.’ I saw them take Melissa to search her and a few others. Jack had cannabis in his pocket so was arrested.

I decided to lodge a complaint against the police for interfering in a religious ritual, so wrote a letter. I tried to encourage Jack and the others to do the same.

A few weeks later there was a knock on the door. It was a man from the Police Complaints Department, about my letter. I explained that although that UCHASH was no more part of my beliefs than the Cathedral’s version of Christianity, I did believe that people had the Human Right to choose and practice their own beliefs and that I thought police had acted unnecessarily. I said that a chillum was part of their religion and showed him my collection; I said I have many Buddha’s too, but I am not a Buddhist. He said that I was the only person in the country that had complained about it. So, I said in that case I will drop the complaint.

I moved to Mornington Road, in Norwich, and Melissa moved too.

Whilst living there, I initiated a case against the British Government in the European Court of Human Rights, over their interference without good reason, with the belief that consumption of cannabis was good for them. I collected over 600 statements from people, but had no legal representation due to lack of funds. Several months later it was thrown out at the administrative level, so never went to the court itself; they said there was no appeal process and they did not have to give reasons.

In 1999, Jack Girling and I officially registered the ‘Legalise Cannabis Alliance (LCA)’ as a political party. I became the Nominating Officer and National Coordinator, whose job is to officially authorise candidates to use the part name and emblem. Jack was put as leader although we made it clear to the Elections Committee that it was “for the purposes of registration only.” We did not want a party leader. We wanted a single-issue, cannabis-focussed, party with independent candidates that couple express their own views on other issues.

By that time, Jack’s scrap yard, which he’d used as the base for his campaign, also a wood yard, burned down and Jack was living in his mother’s house in Peacock Street.

One day Jack said we should have a conference for the LCA, so I booked a room in Wensum Lodge in Kings Street, Norwich. After a while I went to see Jack and asked what he was doing to promote the conference. “Nothing”, he said, “We should leave it up to the Lord.”

I said I thought that God was supposed to help those that helped themselves and that leaving it up to the Lord may be why we were in such a mess in the world today.

The room was full of smoke and Jack stood up and went to open the door, then asking the six or seven people there to leave. Then he came and grabbed me by my shirt and told me to get out. I left. I have never been inside anywhere that Jack lived, although I still let him into my house. By then I had moved again, into the rented house where I still live, twenty years later, in Woodcock Road. I am sad to say that he often turned up late at night, talking about what God had supposedly said to him. I never really knew what he was going on about. For me he is entitled to his beliefs and religion but I don’t need to be preached to. By the time he left, often at 2 am, I was wound up. So in fact I felt better off without him. I became the Party Leader, again in name only, as well as National Coordinator and Nominating Officer.

We had our first LCA party conference, it was a great success with about a hundred in attendance and Howard Marks as guest speaker. I was not sure The Lord did much to help though.

We had a couple of candidates in parliamentary by-elections: the ex-labour Mayor of Carlisle, Colin Paisley stood in Kensington and Chelsea against Michael Portillo. Derek Large stood in Romsey.

The Late Colin Paisley

The Late Derrick Large

In 2001, LCA had thirteen candidates in the General Election. I stood in Norwich South, against Charles Clarke.

That was again a whole new experience for me; not just designing fliers but doing interviews with the local press and radio station and attending Hustings alongside career politicians.

At Hustings, I had to answer questions on subjects such as education, the problem with administration at the colleges, pollution on the Norwich ring road, pensioners and even immigration. I found I could bring cannabis to many issues. I was also aware that Charles Clarke was listening closely. I did notice that he liked to drink.

At the Hustings at UEA, we were invited for a sherry beforehand, in the Union Presidents office. Charles was there with his wife. He got up and picked up two glasses of sherry. As he sat down, he said something to his wife (well I assume it was his wife, it may have been his election agent). She stood up and went and picked up two more glasses of Sherry,

Our party manifesto was called :

‘CANNABIS; LEGALISE AND UTILISE.’

I received over 700 votes about 1.6%, which I was pleased with.

LCA had overeighty candidates in various elections between 1999 and 2006. We distributed almost a million fliers, had a party broadcast on TV in Wales, and radio and TV throughout Britain.

In 2001, I testified before the Home Affairs Select Committee, debated at the Oxford Union and participated in numerous TV and radio interviews and all with no previous experience and on s show-string budget.

Also, in 2002, I worked on a project with Don Barnard, a document with information and logical arguments that we could present to the MP’s. We even had one printed in Braille, for David Blunkett, the then Home Secretary. We sent a copy to every MP. Although we did not end up changing the law, we did see cannabis temporarily down-graded, which, I was told by an MP, was much to do with the LCA and this document. It was called:

CANNABIS;CHALLENGING THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM