Tory MP Crispin Blunt ‘comes out’ as popper user during Commons debate
By Will Stroude
British politician Crispin Blunt has ‘come out’ as a poppers user during a parliamentary debate on whether to ban the recreational drug,
The Conservative MP for Reigate admitted he was “astonished” by plans to ban the drug as the House of Commons debated the government’s proposed Psychoactive Substances Bill today (January 20).
“There are sometimes that something is proposed which becomes personal to you and you realise the government is about to do something fantastically stupid and in those circumstances one has a duty to speak up,” Mr Blunt – who came out as gay publicly in 2010 – told members this afternoon.
“I use poppers. I out myself as a user of poppers. I am astonished to find [the government] is proposing it to be banned and frankly so would many other gay men.”
‘Poppers’ is the slang term given to amyl nitrate, a chemical which is inhaled to produce a short, sharp head rush, relax muscles, and it is often used by gay men as a sexual aide.
The government plans to ban the drug as part of a new ‘blanket ban’ on the production, distribution, sale and supply of psychoactive substances – or ‘legal highs’ – such as laughing gas and the hallucination-inducing herb salvia.
Mr Blunt added that outlawing poppers would “simply serve to bring the whole law into disrepute”, and warned that it would “drive supply underground, into the hands of criminals
Under the current proposed plans, poppers will be banned in the UK for sale or purchase, including imports from online websites, from April 2016.
Gay health charities and a committee of MPs have argued that poppers are “not seen to be capable of having harmful effects sufficient to constitute a societal problem” and should not be covered by the proposed law.
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