PLAYING with my little son on the park swings – him laughing with every push – is one of life’s joys. 
Then a smell hits your nostrils, that oh so pungent stench of cannabis and the fun stops. 


As you walk away, you naturally look around. 
Is it the group of teenagers huddled on a bench? Is it one of the dog walkers?

Or is it another father playing with his young daughter? It could even be all three. 


Openly smoking cannabis has been allowed to become prevalent in public places in St Helens. 


The town centre, the parks, the buses, even the cemetery. Everyone will have smelt it. 


Perhaps it’s the reduction in park rangers, scant police resources diverted elsewhere or that you simply don’t care anymore. 


It also strikes me that whilst there are no alcohol zones across the borough for a legal drug; illegal cannabis use is tolerated in those very same places. 


As we seem happy to fine people for dropping litter and issuing parking tickets, why don’t we also let private firms collect fines for smoking cannabis in public as well?


At £90 a pop, I’m sure there would be a few jobs created and some money back into council coffers.


We don’t want to leave the park early anymore.


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