> Any level headed person, forget a politician, would want to experiment first, see the results, gauge and then expand selectively. That is common sense.
> I guess when you are a dictator ish government and you rule the country with an iron first, the institutions of the state stop being anything and simply become rubber stamps.
The precautionary principle. I've noticed this is ever-more fiercely applied to anything involving protection of the environment, but never, ever applied to protection of national ethnicities and culture in Western countries - where the mere mention of latter invites being cancelled.
If there's one thing the government will protect more jealously than pretty much anything else, it's their monopoly on violence, and preventing the government dipping its beak comes a close second.
The only possible upside to this is that the poor Sri Lankans will breathe a little more easily for a while - I remember that the pollution in Colombo was pretty appalling (not that that's their fault). I really feel for them, as in my experience SL had some pretty drastic poverty in parts to begin with.
A smart government would incentivise the population to invest in British industry, which would develop the economy and reduce this ridiculous industrial-investment-killing monster in the shape of the property market. But, this is England: a place where good ideas that might benefit the masses are generally either strangled at birth or sold off for a pittance.
'Smoking powerful skunk cannabis triples the risk of suffering a serious psychotic episode, scientists have found.'
'Those who reported smoking milder forms of the drug, such as hash, did not appear to be at increased risk, for instance. Murray said that, in line with this finding, he recommends hash to patients who are struggling to give up smoking altogether.'