The Lib Dem rebellion over the ban on khat has opened up the chance of Labour stopping the measure dead in its tracks, but after several months it’s still not clear what the party’s policy is.

This afternoon there’ll be a statutory instrument committee meeting on the ban, which needs to vote in favour of it before it hits the floor of the House for a second vote.

The eight Conservative MPs on the committee  will be whipped to support a ban and the two Lib Dem MPs will oppose it. That leaves the seven Labour MPs (and one Jim Shannon) deciding what they’re going to do. If they abstain, or vote in favour, it’s game over – opponents of the measure probably won’t even bother opposing it on the floor of the House. There’s only so much anyone can bang their head against a wall. But if they vote against it, Theresa May’s plan could be brought to a halt.

Labour is in a bit of a conundrum. Usually it would support any effort to ban a drug. That’s just how it’s brain is wired nowadays. But it may be seduced by the prospect of humiliating the home secretary. Labour MP and home affairs committee chairman Keith Vaz has also lobbied strongly for the ban to be halted.

And the party does has several defences at its disposal, not least of all:

The fact that the drug is as potent as coffee
The fact the ban has no evidential basis to support it
The fact no consultation has been undertaken, despite the potential for it alienate a large section of the UK’s Somali, Yemeni and Kenyan communities
And the fact that prohibition could bolster Islamic terror group Al-Shabab
The Daily Mail report that Lib Dem Home Office minister Norman Baker has washed his hands of the move is accurate. Baker was promoted after the decision had been made, so there wasn’t much he could do about it, and now he’s distancing himself from it.

The job has been passed on to modern slavery and organised crime minister Karen Bradley to take forward, which is ironic, because there currently is no organised criminal involvement in khat, although there will be if they ban it.

POLITICS.CO.UK

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