More Kids Are Selling Weed in the UK Than Ever Before

According to The Daily Mail, the number of kids selling weed has "soared". By 61 cases. Over the course of nine years.

The data, obtained through a Freedom of Information request, shows that the number of children aged between ten and 17 arrested for cannabis possession with intent to supply has risen from 132 in 2005 to 193 in 2014, the last year stats are available.

The Mail argues that more kids are selling weed because a "growing 'back door' decriminalisation of cannabis means experts fear children smoke and sell the class B drug believing there will be no consequences".

The "back door" decriminalisation they're talking about refers to police chiefs in various British districts – Durham, Derbyshire, Surrey and Dorset – either publicly telling their staff not to bother arresting cannabis users for possession or investigating small-scale grow operations, or quietly introducing the same kind of measures. The problem is, none of that happened until 2015 – a year after these stats were gathered.

That discrepancy aside – and ignoring the fact that some of these kids may well be runners who've been peer-pressured into selling weed, and aren't doing so because of a perceived lack of danger – the Mail appears to be missing a pretty basic point: with full decriminalisation, the trade would be taken off the streets and put in the hands of licensed professionals who could only sell regulated and taxed product to adults.

There's no doubt some kind of black market would still exist, but at nowhere near the kind of scale it's at now. It's also a change that would make the UK economy billions every year, and – if stats from American states where pot has been legalised are anything to go by – would not lead to a rise in use among adolescents.

The Mail, bizarrely, goes on to round up its article by decrying the fact that fewer people are being arrested for cannabis possession – a decrease of 61 percent between 2010 and 2014, from 4,466 to 1,751 – because presumably criminalising young people for possessing small amounts of weed is a good thing?

More on VICE:

The New 'Must-Have' Weed That's Got British Stoners Spending Up to £700 an Ounce

Yes, You Can Be Allergic to Pot

Drug Dealers Explain What Students Buy During Exam Season