Blunkett: Hard or soft on drugs?

Seldom has Home Secretary David Blunkett appeared more ill an ease, almost apologetic, than over his policy on cannabis.

The minister, who usually revels in his hard man image, is having to justify his decision to downgrade dope to a class C drug. And he patently does not enjoy it.

He has confessed that, unlike some of his tougher policies, he "agonised" over this one.

He has even had to launch an expensive advertising campaign to warn people that, despite the re-classification, cannabis is still illegal and potentially dangerous.

And, speaking on the Today programme, he insisted that if he smelled youngsters smoking cannabis in public he would turn them in to the police.