I would, however, like to make a few clarifications. I stand foremost accused of having claimed that there was no Home Affairs Committee in 1983, and this appears to be the point over which Peter Reynolds has stated he intends to take legal action against me. I would note that I have never said such a thing, and that I did, in fact, include a screencap below from the House of Commons specifically noting that the Committee has been in existence since 1979.

My point has been, all along, that I was sent an email, from the House of Commons itself, that states that there was no committee inquiry into cannabis laws in 1983, as the document appears to state. I think this raises questions, questions which Peter Reynolds did not, for some reason, wish to answer until he started to threaten legal action. Questions are legitimate things to pose.

I have acted in good faith – if the HAC subsequently unearths an inquiry to Peter Reynolds that it previously denied existing to me, then obviously I will update this article. I have NOT accused Peter Reynolds of forging the document in question, I merely reported that I have been sent various messages suggesting this, and specifically adding an addendum that I myself had yet to find any of these messages convincing. I personally find it far more likely that Peter Reynolds did in fact write a 30 page document about cannabis laws in 1983, than that he made the entire thing up over the summer of 2011, when the report first appeared. However, neither supposition is yet demonstrable, and I have made no claim either way.

I will also note that Mr. Reynolds has made a point of linking to this file on the UKCIA website as some kind of rebuttal – a document which was written after 1985, and contains no references to any inquiry in 1983, only mentioning the same 1985 report into the Misuse of Hard Drugs that my email from the Home Affairs Committee mentions in the screencap below. I am not too sure what exactly Mr. Reynolds is seeking to demonstrate to me here.

I have also had my own Freedom of Information Request pending with the House of Commons since early January to determine whether this report was ever submitted to the Home Affairs Committee at any time, and I imagine it will report back sooner than Mr. Reynolds’ FOI – when it does I will course publish the results here, whether it was submitted or whether it was not.

Sarah

UPDATE: Darryl Bickler has also published this statement:

For the record, I have not, and do not accuse Mr Reynolds of forgery. My comments concerned the point that the article by Sarah McCulloch raised questions as to the authenticity of a Report allegedly submitted to an Inquiry in 1983. I noted that Mr Reynolds had not addressed the salient questions, nor has yet to explain why he submitted this report when the closet drug related inquiry was seemingly on hard drugs in 1985. I sought to tease out these questions so that he might answer those directly and settle the matter. At this time I was strongly in favour of fairness in the conduct of Mr Reynolds’ many critics who in my view were ‘over-cooking’ some allegations. I do not extend this criticism to Ms McCulloch who in my view was only asking questions, legitimate questions even if cynically posed. My position was, and still is, wait and see if a definitive answer can be found.

I have in fact referred to the lack of any conclusive evidence for either contention, and insist on fairness of treatment to any person undergoing criticism or allegations. I strongly resist any accusation or inference that I have at any time acted improperly or short of the standards expected from a solicitor. Any legal action against me will be forcefully defended, and any complaint made against me to the professional standards body will also be contested in the strongest terms. Both of these threats are ill-conceived on legal grounds, and are also ill-befitting of an aspiring politician or a campaigner for greater liberty for cannabis users.

Mr Reynolds has in my view demonstrated his unsuitability for public office through his anti-Jewish remarks when he conflated the actions of the state of Israel with those of the Nazis, and cursed the ‘evil Jews’ rather than address the legitimate concern correctly. I endured these remarks as perhaps a mistake in his terminology as I did with his homophobic remarks concerning gay fashion designers perverting normal heterosexual standards. However for me he has ultimately crossed the line with his response to Sarah’s critical investigative journalism (which in itself was doubtless spurned by anger at the article mentioned above in which he inferred that homosexuality was a perversion) by making personal comments that equate homosexuality with genetic ‘confusion’ as this sows the seeds of a very insidious politic, and is in my view entirely inconsistent with the possibility of enrolling the public into a more tolerant view about personal choice to use cannabis, or any claim to greater respect for the individual.