Liverpool

Law Enforcement

For a small personal amount, Merseyside police might take the weed, note your details and release you, sometimes with a warning. A big chunk or several bags, repeated warnings or suspicion of dealing could change the outcome. Smoking openly drew more attention, and suspected drug-driving was treated much more seriously. Public transport was the better call after smoking.

NORML described possession as a low priority at the time and said fines were the usual court outcome. The 2008 Guardian coverage was pointed to as another place to follow the period’s UK drug-policy debate. The separate Marijuana Laws section covers the more recent legal position.

Where to Buy Marijuana

Open-air deals could draw attention, so delivery by phone became the norm. A friend, someone from the hotel kitchen smoking out back or a friendly face at a bar could make an introduction. A quiet, polite chat with someone smoking outside a busy pub was sometimes the quickest route. A sniff and a poke before handing over any money helped, and a whole crowd of salespeople around one lone buyer was a good reason to walk away. Some Scousers were the loveliest people you could meet. Others could leave you without your money, your weed or any idea what just happened.

Cream had a reputation for searches at the door and offers as soon as you got inside. That was the odd balance of the nightclub scene. Some bouncers were said to sell to customers, while others passed information to police.

Marijuana Prices

• Flower: £20 for an eighth, £35–40 for a quarter, £60 for a half ounce and £100–120 for an ounce
• Hash: £15 for a quarter and £40 for an ounce in one price list
• An earlier set of flower prices put a quarter at £25 (about US$40 then) and a half ounce at £45
• Another set of hash prices put an eighth at £15 (roughly US$25 then), a quarter at £25 and a half ounce at £40
• Dark Moroccan hash: £90–100 an ounce, a price said to have held for a decade at the time

Types of Marijuana

UK-grown super skunk was everywhere at times. The stronger it was, the more you’d pay. Jamaican and West African varieties came up alongside homegrown flower. Hash generally came from Morocco or Lebanon. Scouser pot could make a night feel relaxed and make it easy to chat.

More Information

Liverpool is a west-coast seaport, about four hours by train from London in the account. The Beatles put it on the world map in the early 1960s. Mathew Street still leads you through their old haunts, and Wood Street and Slater Street were busy with pubs and dance clubs. Students packed the Blue Angel on Wood Street for relatively cheap drinks and ’70s and ’80s music. Give Crosby Beach a visit, too.

Paul McCartney became Liverpool’s most famous Scouser and a very public pot smoker. There was a 1973 fine over plants in a greenhouse on his Scottish farm, a Japanese possession arrest dated 1981 in the account, and a 1984 trip to Barbados that ended in possession fines. Linda McCartney was arrested after they returned to England. Paul then publicly called for decriminalization. Some people in government wanted reform too. Dame Ruth Runciman called for a review of drug laws after three decades, including reduced possession penalties, and ministers were considering whether cannabis warnings should have to be disclosed to employers.

The period’s coverage called Britain the “cannabis capital of Europe.” The BBC used that phrase in 1999, reporting higher weed consumption in England and Wales than elsewhere in the EU. NORML cited a Bristol University study of 95 officers who ranked cannabis below coffee for addictiveness. Presented with four plants and harvested weed visible in a house, two-thirds said they wouldn’t arrest the grower. The scene had a medical side too, with the coverage describing limited prescribing and widespread informal use in bars and clubs.

NORML’s period legal account drew a distinction between drug use, with an exception it cited for opium, and possession. It described three penalty categories, citing up to six months or a fine for cannabis or resin possession and up to a year for trafficking under the rules it discussed. Liverpool’s use of first-time cautions could give a misleading sense of how much the police would overlook. Chief Constable Norman Bettison stressed Merseyside Police’s focus on gathering evidence against dealers.