10 AUGUST 2002, Page 26

Making a hash of it

From Dr Philip M. Peverley Sir: The insouciance with which Petronella Wyatt smokes one joint and then sets herself up as an authority on drugs (Singular life, 27 July) is staggering. She knows nothing about it. 'Cannabis is rather sneered at in circles which consider themselves modish,' she tells us. 'This is probably the best argument of all for its legalisation.' The next time I am called out to admit a snivelling, bleeding schizophrenic forcibly to psychiatric hospital, after one joint too many has brought on a full psychosis, I will be sure to ask, as

the police bundle him into the van, whether he considers the circles he moves in to be modish.

Philip Peverley

Roker, Sunderland