A London police experiment in warning rather than prosecuting people for possessing cannabis has been extended by up to three months, Scotland Yard said today.
The contentious six-month pilot scheme in Lambeth, south London, was due to end on December 31 but the Yard has decided to leave it in place pending two reports of its success.
"Two evaluations are being carried out, one by the Met Management Consultancy Group and the other by the Police Foundation.
"No decision on whether to extend the warning scheme across the Met will be made until February or March, and the scheme in Lambeth will continue to be used until then," a Scotland Yard spokesman told PA News.
Under the experiment people found in possession of small quantities of cannabis are let off with a formal warning rather than being arrested and cautioned.
If the reports indicate the scheme has been a success it could be rolled out across the capital.
The decision will also encourage Home Secretary David Blunkett to press ahead with his plan to reclassify cannabis from a "Class B" drug to a "Class C" drug.
He is awaiting a report from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs for scientific advice before going ahead - but the group first recommended reclassifying cannabis in 1979 and the move is no more than a rubber-stamping exercise.
The Met revealed statistics today that show officers in Lambeth have continued to stop people suspected of drugs possession.
The latest figures show that they issued 381 warnings to people caught with cannabis between July 2 and November 30, the Yard spokesman said.
Names and addressed were taken and cannabis confiscated.
Last year officers arrested 278 people for cannabis possession in the same period.
The Yard spokesman added: "Without the full evaluation, it would be wrong to read too much into the figures, but they do show that officers in Lambeth are using the scheme.
"The number of warnings is higher than the number of arrests which shows that our officers are not ignoring cannabis possession.
"The amount of cannabis being seized indicates domestic use, rather than dealing."
PA