Another week in Westminster, and yet another crisis for Gordon Brown and his cabinet. The sacking of Professor David Nutt, the chief drugs advisor to the government, has led to some class A criticism of what is perceived to be a confused stance on drugs from Labour.

Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary, asked Professor Nutt to leave his position as head of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) last week. In a lecture at King’s College London, Nutt had argued that the separation of cannabis from legal ‘drugs’ such as tobacco and alcohol was ‘artificial’, in that there is very little difference between the three in terms of potential damage to the user.

The sentiments expressed by Nutt can be contrasted with the government’s supposed tough stance on drug use, which is evidenced through the current classification of cannabis as a class B drug. Alan Johnson argued that Nutt’s comments can be seen as ‘crossing a line’ into politics, adding that, “you cannot have a chief drugs advisor at the same time stepping into the political field and campaigning against government decisions.”

In his response, Professor Nutt issued a scathing rebuke to Johnson, stating that his sacking amounted to a “serious challenge to the value of science in relation to the government.” Furthermore, he claimed that the government only looked to expert advice in order to “rubber stamp a pre-determined position’, with previous decisions regarding drugs policies having been taken up ‘on the whim of the Prime Minister’.”

Nutt also predicted that the remaining members of the ACMD would question whether they could remain in their positions. This prediction became prophecy in the following days as two more leading members of the ACMD, namely Dr Les King and Marion Walker, resigned in protest to Nutt’s sacking.

The ACMD went on to write an open letter to the government asking whether they would be able to talk publicly about their research findings in the future without the threat of being reprimanded by the government. If the answer to this is negative, then it is likely that Gordon Brown can expect even more members of the ACMD to walk, thus exacerbating a situation where experts across all fields must be questioning the value of their contributions to the government in policy formulation.

So what can we make of all this? What are the implications for the government in terms of their drugs policy?

Alan Johnson’s decision to sack Professor Nutt allows us to make certain assumptions about this government’s stance on drugs. Nutt’s recent comments were seemingly designed to trigger a debate about why we differentiate tobacco and alcohol use from drugs such as cannabis, when scientific research tells us that the effects of all three can be equally damaging.

For the government, this is not a debate that you want to occur when you have re-affirmed a tough stance towards cannabis use within the last year, having bumped it up to class B status under the previous Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith. The reasons for that move related to the apparent uncertainty regarding the effects of cannabis use on mental health.

In light of Professor Nutt’s sacking, we can perhaps gather from his retaliatory comments that the government has been consistently told that the class B status of the drug is out of line with the actual effects of the drug, especially when compared with other legal drugs. This can be seen with Nutt’s assurance in his lecture at King’s College that cannabis posed only a ‘relatively small risk’ of psychotic illness.

It could be argued therefore that Labour’s drugs policy is not necessarily confused, but is certainly an issue that has been politicised in a negative way. Many may now see the policy on cannabis as having been formulated in order for people to see Labour as a government that is tough on drugs, rather than one that has acted upon the good advice of its experts. Regardless of whether Nutt was right or wrong to act as he did as the government’s chief drugs advisor, it is now relatively clear that in this field of expertise the government has been making decisions that run contrary to expert advice. The scientific and perhaps even societal consensus that cannabis should not be a class B drug has been overridden. Professor Nutt’s frustration can be understood. Why should he, a leading expert in his field, be asked to approve pre-determined policies regardless of whether they fit scientific truth?

While the power to formulate policy on issues such as drugs should always be in the hands of an elected and accountable body, the government should maybe start acting more upon the advice of its experts. Otherwise, why have them? To what extent the government’s actions amount to censorship of an inconvenient scientific opinion remains to be seen, but unless the government changes its course, it risks alienating itself from the whole scientific community.