Home Office reply and initial smoking extract, 13 March 2026

JBD request: 24 February 2026 · JBD filing reference: FOI_1C1 · Authority case reference: FOI2026/02862

JBD request date: 24 February 2026
JBD internal filing reference: FOI_1C1
Authority case reference: FOI2026/02862

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Home Office ministerial disclosure

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2 Marsham Street
London SW1P 4DF
www.gov.uk/home-office

Pete Lindsay
pete.lindsay@justicebydesign.org.uk

13 March 2026

Dear Pete Lindsay
Freedom of Information Request: FOI2026/02862

Thank you for your email of 24 February, which we have included as Annex A. Your
request has been handled as a request for information under the Freedom of Information
Act 2000 (FOIA).

For points 1 and 2 of your request, we can disclose the information set out in the enclosed
Annex B and Annex C. We have provided the recommendation made by the ACMD to the
Home Office at the time the legislation was under consideration, and the government’s
response. This has been included in Annex B. We have also provided advice from Home
Office and DHSC officials on smoking, that was provided to the Minister at the time the
decision was under consideration. This has been included in Annex C.

For point 3 of your request we have searched for the requested document or passage and
did not find a result.
If you are dissatisfied with this response you may request an independent internal review
of our handling of your request by submitting a complaint within two months
to foirequests@homeoffice.gov.uk, quoting reference FOI2026/02862. If you ask for an
internal review, it would be helpful if you could say why you are dissatisfied with the
response.
As part of any internal review the Department's handling of your information request would
be reassessed by staff who were not involved in providing you with this response. If you
were to remain dissatisfied after an internal review, you would have a right of complaint to
the Information Commissioner as established by section 50 of the FOIA.
A link to the Home Office Information Rights Privacy Notice can be found in the following
link. This explains how we process your personal
information: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/information-rights-privacy-notice.
Yours sincerely
Public Safety Group

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ANNEX A

Thank you for your response under section 12 of the Act in relation to my FOI 1C request.
In light of that response, I am narrowing the scope of my enquiry.
I now seek only identification of the recorded material relied upon when making the
following statement in ministerial correspondence:
“The ACMD has previously recommended that any prescription of cannabis-based
products for medicinal use should not include smoking as a route of administration due to
the harms associated with smoking.”
Please provide:
1. The specific Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) document(s),
report(s), letter(s), minutes, or other recorded advice relied upon when making the above
statement.

2. For each document identified:
o the title,
o the date, and
o the specific paragraph, section, or passage relied upon.

3. Identification of any ACMD document or passage in which criminal prohibition of
smoked administration of a prescribed cannabis-based product for medicinal use was
recommended.
If no such document or passage exists in relation to paragraph 3, please confirm this
explicitly.

For clarity, I am not requesting drafting history, internal policy analysis, equality
assessments, or wider documentation. I am requesting only identification of the recorded
ACMD material relied upon for the specific ministerial statement quoted above.
If this refined request is considered to exceed the appropriate cost limit, I would be grateful
for advice under section 16 of the Act as to how it may be further narrowed so that the
relevant recorded material can be identified.
If any exemption is relied upon, please identify the exemption(s) engaged and provide the
recorded reasoning, including the outcome of any public interest test.

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ANNEX B – RELEVANT PARAGRAPHS FROM DOCUMENTS TITLED:

"LETTER FROM THE ACMD TO THE HOME SECRETARY RE: CONSULTATION ON
CANNABIS-DERIVED MEDICINAL PRODUCTS" (DATED 11 SEPTEMBER 2018); AND

“LETTER FROM THE HOME SECRETARY TO THE ACMD RE: CANNABIS-BASED
PRODUCTS FOR MEDICINAL USE” (DATED 21 SEPTEMBER 2018)

Route of administration
The ACMD previously identified potential risks related to inappropriate prescribing and
diversion of CDMPs. In addition to providing a clear content description, the form and
specific dosing instructions should, as with any other prescription, be clearly stated on the
prescription. The ACMD recommends that the route of administration be included as an
additional prescription requirement for CDMPs. The ACMD does not anticipate that
smoking will be a permissible route of administration of a CDMP as there is evidence of
harms associated with smoking Cannabis.

Recommendation 6 The DHSC and NHS England (and their equivalents in Scotland,
Wales and Northern Ireland) to ensure that the route of administration is stated on
prescriptions to help to ensure patient safety and reduce diversion. Producers of
CDMPs should be required to state the appropriate route of consumption of their
product. CDMPs should not be administered by smoking.

We accept this recommendation.

The Human Medicines Regulations 2012 require that dispensed medicines are labelled
with instructions for use so that patients are clear how products should be administered,
how often and in what strength. Pharmacists can seek advice from the prescriber if this is
not clear from the prescription/direction. In sourcing products, the pharmacists or importers
will wish to make sure the product is suitable for the specified route of administration.
We share the ACMD’s concerns about the smoking of these cannabis-based products for
medicinal use due to the known harms of smoking and the potential operational impact on
misuse and diversion this could have due to its close association with recreational
cannabis. As such, we have decided to include this restriction within the amendment to the
2001 Regulations which means that the administration of cannabis-based products for
medicinal use by smoking will remain prohibited.

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ANNEX C – ‘SMOKING SECTION OF SUBMISSION TITLED CANNABIS: OPTIONS ON
DEFINITION OF CANNABIS BASED MEDICINAL PRODUCTS (CBPMs)’

This submission was sent from the Home Office Drugs and Alcohol Unit to the Home
Secretary and Policing Minister for a decision on 13 September 2018, and set out the
proposed approach to smoking:

Smoking
11. You have previously raised concerns about the potential for medicinal cannabis
products to be smoked. This concern is reflected in the ACMD’s advice which states
‘Cannabis Derived Medicinal Products should not be administered by smoking’.
Some controls already exist in this regard in relation to landlords/occupiers to prevent
smoking in premises, but these will be difficult to enforce and will not prevent cannabis
being smoked in public.

12. DHSC colleagues assess the likelihood that specialist clinicians prescribing
cannabis for the purposes of smoking to be extremely low (even without further
mitigating action). This likelihood is legitimately applicable only in limited situations where
the harm of smoking is outweighed by the benefit to the patient, for example in a terminally
ill patient (eg relief of nausea in cancer sufferers). This means that the circumstances in
which cannabis could be legitimately prescribed for smoking would be very narrow. Given
the potential diversion risk that this would represent, we recommend taking further action
to mitigate against the risk of cannabis being smoked.

13. We propose the following to mitigate the risk of smoking.
a. Inclusion of a specific regulation to prevent administration of cannabis by smoking:
We propose introducing a requirement for a person not to administer a cannabis
based product for medicinal use in humans by smoking.
b. Strong guidance: NHS England will issue guidance to accompany the law change in
October, providing strong messages in the clinical guidance that prescribing
cannabis for the purposes of smoking is unlikely to be appropriate, whether
prescribed privately or in the NHS.
c. Professional regulation: Specialist clinicians are subject to professional regulation
by the General Medical Council. Any prescribing contrary to that outlined in NHS
England guidance could be considered in disciplinary proceedings. Serious or
persistent failure to follow professional guidance could result in clinicians being
restricted in practice, suspended, or struck off. Should a specialist clinician
prescribe for the purposes of recreational use (i.e. rogue prescription), s/he will be
going outside their powers as a prescriber and may therefore be committing an
offence of unlawful supply and criminal sanctions may apply.
14. The approach of restricting smoking within the regulations has the benefit of
establishing a clear line between licit and illicit/recreational use of cannabis. It would
make clear to a police officer encountering smoking on the street for example, that an
offence has likely been committed and serves to mitigate against the risk of
decriminalisation by the back door.

15. This restriction would not apply to vaping. We envisage that some patients might
use an appropriate medicinal devise to vape a cannabis-based product. This could be a
legitimate approach clinically.