Nitrous oxide: Laughing gas to be illegal by end of year
There will be exemptions for legitimate uses of nitrous oxide, for example in medical or catering industries. The gas is commonly used as a painkiller and for producing whipped cream in cooking.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66718165Open linkView original on feddit.uk190
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So, according to the article, supplying Nitrous for recreational use is already illegal. If it is such a big problem, what is banning possession going to do other than ruin more lives? It is kind of wild that this is the solution they came up with given the history of drug prohibition worldwide and the fact that UK is one of the originators of harm reduction.
Sigh.... making the same mistakes and expecting different results when plenty of research out there shows that treating poverty and depression does more to reduce drug use and other risky/antisocial behaviour than putting people in jail for it.
The article also mentions that the majority of people who use it are between 16 and 24 years old. Great way to end up with hardened criminals down the line.
Most of our political establishment is still in complete denial about the failure of the war on drugs. They keep doubling down on prohibition because they can’t accept it doesn’t work.
I’m not sure what or who it will take to wake up Westminster to the reality. Those few that have tried to change the course, such as David Nutt, have had little success. The Liberal Democrats still have cannabis legalisation as a policy, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they step back from that as they eye up more traditionally Tory seats (if they haven’t already).
I wish they would just make cannabis legal, and then just not make a big thing of it. It's such a non-policy when you think about it, "oh we're going to stop criminalising people who've barely done anything wrong, aren't we wonderful".
They view every policy as something that will either gain them votes or lose them votes so the idea of just doing something quietly is alien to them.
Prohibition works! (for people who profit off the misery of others)
Now double banned for your safety.
It's alright though. All these can users are all white kids. Can't believe this foreign owned government to start a drug war against a race that's not not white
So...
You'll still be able to buy it "for whip cream"...
It's just now cops will be able to arrest you for it if you have it now.
That's not exactly a ban, and it's not going to make it any harder to obtain.
So in other words it isn't even necessarily something they can convict for. Strawberries and whipped cream at the park anyone?
You're going to at least have to be seeing a mate that owns the equipment to use it for cream at the park. If you just stick it in a pot and let rip, you're going to spray non-whipped cream everywhere, which I bet would mean a court wouldn't consider it reasonable doubt.
They're not hard to get nor expensive, and here are instructions to use it legitimately.
Does the UK not have a "beyond a reasonable doubt" requirement? How the hell are they going to prove beyond a reasonable doubt it was going to be misused unless they literally witnessed the act? As long as you don't say anything, you could have purchased it for anyone or anything.
You're applying brains and logic to a situation where they were never deployed.
There's a fairly high chance that this law will never be enacted anyway. Given the current political situation we may have a new government by February 2024.
The doubt has to be reasonable, and it undermines your defence if you don't answer questions. The prosecutor will ask you what you were going to do with the canister. If you decline to answer, you've not created reasonable doubt. If you say you were going to make whipped cream, there'll be follow-up questions, like whether you had the equipment to do so. If you don't, then it's not reasonable to take your claims at face value, so there isn't reasonable doubt.
Yaaaay another black market. Just what the government needs, gotta keep the black budget funded.
Who wouldnt want criminals to have a Monopoly on drug trade?
I won't miss seeing those cannisters littered around.
So why not make it legitimate with a deposit scheme?
And even better, also legalise drugs like weed which these are being used as a legal substitute for?
Nos isn't a substitute for weed...
Neither is alcohol. But with freer access to cannabis in Canada fewer are drinking as much.
I agree that weed should be legalised.
Absolutely, although I wouldn't say NOS is substituted for weed all that much. Also, the legal limit for weed and driving should be raised, particularly since the government asked the scientific community where the level of impairment was and then set it lower.
I'm in favour of legalising drugs, but driving is dangerous and should only be done when you are sober and able to give your full attention.
Absolutely, however if the level of intoxication is below the level of impairment, then the drug is not having a negative effect on driving.
We have this discussion currently about Weed in Germany. Its so annoying to See articles with headlines Like "cannabis behind the wheel" etc. Noone ist advocating for people to Drive under the influence. But If i smoked a Joint on friday and get stopped on monday, i'll lose my drivers license even though im sober. Drugs stay in your system way longer than the actual effect.
It's a lot of effort to built up such a deposit system
It's in no way unfeasible - and the deposits end up paying for the ongoing operation of the system.
Which is better, addressing the littering problem directly, or criminalising and litigating against a bunch of people with a law that can't be enforced if they have a can of cream on them?
The deposit is just a deposit, it doesn't pay for anything. Are you sure you understand how the deposit in this case works? You pay for something and you get that back when you return the item.
Maybe you should look into something like the Finnish bottle deposit scheme. It's great but those take quite some time and effort to set up and get running properly.
Not everyone returns and collects the deposit back, these deposits end up funding the operations.
If the Finnish scheme is anything like the German scheme, that's what I was thinking of. Although it doesn't need to be quite so widespread with machines inside every supermarket.
They'll have to wait with just taking the deposit money since for quite a long time you wouldn't know if they're returning it or not. And if it's anything like other systems, you can return it to different place than the one you paid for, which requires moving money around and whatnot. And there's the issue of getting them from the stores to be recycled and overall upkeep and governance of the system and so on.
The systems are a lot more complex than one might think at first.
I didn't say it was simple, but it's straightforward and very far from unfeasible.
@RaivoKulli @TWeaK if someone hands you 10 cans, they've handed you 10 cans. How don't you know?
They don't need tracking.
(If a store hands you 100kg of cans, they've handed you 100kg. Audit would need you to weigh them and know their name, but little else.)
Won't miss it because they'll continue to be littered around?
"There will be exemptions for legitimate uses of nitrous oxide" Legitimate just means legal so this sentence is saying it will be legal to use it in a legal way... Pretty stupid
No, but it will be illegal to use it illegally.
Yeah, what's so hard to understand here, duh!
Cannabis is being legalised across America and in Germany. Meanwhile Tories are trying to expand the failed war on drugs
Of course our government lives disenfranchising young people, they don't vote conservative.
Unless you're in prison or you were convicted of some kind of voter fraud, you can vote
I feel like it's actually kind of already an illicit substance and therefore illegal.
So at this point they're just making laws to make things that are already illegal more illegal but it doesn't matter because none of them are enforced anyway.
Standard performative right-wing nonsense - political point-scoring through punitive, ineffective, inefficient policy.
You can go online and buy as much laughing gas as you want for your whipping cream needs. Sounds like they are banning that at the end of the year.
Will they even still be in power at the end of the year? I think they're just saying this for the sake of saying something.
They will because they don't have to call an election until next year, and god knows they'll try to cling on to power as long as possible
There's a lot of pressure on Rishi Sunak right now to call an early election. Primarily because the back benches just automatically assume that there's going to be more revelations coming (or equally possible they actually know something), and at this point they actually limiting damage by getting out of power early.
They are thinking about the election cycle after this one.
It is possible
I hate Cruella Braverman.
Protip: you can buy NO2 really cheap on Amazon.
I use it for my nitro cold brew. Am I gonna have to break laws just to continue drinking my own nitro cold brew?
Don't you want N2? Nitrogen? Not N2O (nitrous oxide)?
You can use both. All depends on what kind of texture you like if I'm not mistaken.
Hmm what I read there is a bit of a diff. Pity because the N2 chargers are quite expensive.
Let me try the N20, cos I've got a lot and they're much cheaper.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The government's decision to make possession a crime goes against recommendations from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which advised against new laws to ban nitrous oxide.
Announcing the law change on Tuesday, Home Secretary Suella Braverman said people in the UK were "fed up with yobs abusing drugs in public spaces and leaving behind a disgraceful mess for others to clean up".
The government's crime and policing minister Chris Philp said: "There is no question that abusing laughing gas is dangerous to people's health and it is paramount we take decisive action before the situation gets worse.
Prof David Nutt, from Imperial College London's department of medicine, previously said there was around about one death per year in the UK from around one million nitrous oxide users.
Repeated hits of nitrogen dioxide can deplete body levels of an important vitamin called B12, which, in turn, can cause permanent nerve damage.
It can affect both the spinal cord and the nerves in arms and legs, causing loss of feeling, abnormal sensations and muscle weakness or even full paralysis.
The original article contains 917 words, the summary contains 180 words. Saved 80%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
I need Nos. One of these big ones. Actually, make that 2. And Harry, I need it by tonight.
You need a tuna on white. No crust.
Is this the same NOS used to give dragsters a boost? Ok, that is illegal on most streets but a legitimate use on certain tracks.
This is about its use as a drug, rather than its use in racing.
Also, I'd imagine racing NOS isn't as pure as the food-grade NOS people use recreationally
Not sure if the medical stuff is the same as car stuff exactly, but yes, chemically nitrous oxide is the same as the car fuel.
Its also not illegal for cars to contain it anywhere in north America that i am aware of. Its however terrible for street cars on a normal usage concept. Works ok for short bursts like in drag racing, but i doubt you would see it in a normal or even performance street car.
So long patisserie chefs
How will this affect airsofters?
Airsoft uses green gas (propane), CO2 or compressed air.
Don't they use CO2?
Maybe for the guns.
Genuine No Stupid Question: Doesn't this gaz Affect like the Nerve System which means that it kills slowly people? Compare to something like Cannabis which temporarily only alters the sense but does not damage the body?
https://www.healthline.com/health/nitrous-oxide-side-effects#longterm-effects
Thank you!
How is crying gas legal but laughing gas illegal?
Tear gas is not legal in the UK. Being found in possession of it can lead to a prison sentence of between 6 months and 10 years, and a fine.
Maybe not for you or I, but the police use it.
And doctors & dentists will still legally be able to use laughing gas.