Integrity Versus Lip Service in the Medical Cannabis Industry
A candid reflection on integrity, accountability, and the growing pains of the UK medical cannabis industry — and why patient advocacy still matters most.
By Leila Simpson, United Patients Alliance
Cannabis Industry Council award winners 2025
Accolades and Attacks
Last week was a strange one for me in the UK cannabis industry. I was honoured to receive an Unsung Hero award from the Cannabis Industry Council — an unexpected but deeply appreciated recognition of years of patient advocacy work.
At the same time, I found myself on the receiving end of a professional attack connected to a potential partnership that didn’t materialise. Sadly, experiences like this aren’t rare in our sector. They reflect a wider tension in the UK cannabis landscape — one that celebrates progress and innovation on the surface, but still struggles to uphold the integrity, transparency, and collaboration that true patient advocacy requires.
The UK cannabis industry can sometimes feel like a microcosm of its contradictions: self-congratulatory and optimistic on one hand, while under-resourcing and undermining patient advocates on the other. I’ve seen many well-intentioned projects derailed by ego, poor governance, or lack of accountability. Having worked in politics before entering this space, I don’t use those words lightly.
A Solid Foundation of Transparency and Accountability
That said, real integrity does exist here — I’ve seen it, and I continue to work alongside those who embody it. But we must be clear-eyed. Lip service to patients and progress isn’t enough. If we want this industry to mature and genuinely serve those it claims to represent, transparency and accountability has to be our foundation.
When I was invited to the stage to accept my award, after a lineup of incredible changemakers, I used my minute not to celebrate myself, but to share a difficult truth: in our recent UPA patient survey, the majority of respondents said they were dissatisfied with the service they’d received from the UK medical cannabis system. That message may not have been what the audience wanted to hear — but it was what they needed to hear.
I called on everyone in the room to support patient advocacy groups. We are the bridge between patients and policymakers, between lived experience and systemic change. Yet we remain chronically under-resourced — and too often, misunderstood.
Parting Words
The late Hannah Deacon, a phenomenal patient advocate, spoke to me just before she was diagnosed with the condition that would shortly end her life. Her legacy lives on for us all, and her words to me have never rung truer than this moment when I put my own head above the parapet and received both congratulations and defamation as a result:
“Building bridges is so important. Arguing amongst ourselves gets us nowhere”
So, to every patient advocate reading this: keep your integrity intact. Hold your boundaries. Be wary of anyone who claims to serve patients but resists accountability. Look for evidence they are walking the walk that they’re talking.
The stakes are too high to aim at the wrong target.
We Measure You By Your Actions
The United Patients Alliance has endured through many years of achievements and unfounded attacks - and we will continue doing so. But I would far prefer to lead our team against external attacks, whilst collaborating and supporting each other, along with anyone and everyone who shares our vision. There’s something so deflating about being unfairly attacked by someone who says they have the same aim as you, but they are actively undermining your ability to achieve that aim. This is where my point about lip service comes from.
Anyone can say they support better access to better quality medicine in the UK.
We measure people and companies by their actions, not words.
We are in the process of reaching out to collaborators to try to keep patients at the heart of the UK industry. Our shared aim, and associated actions must be clear — growing a fair, transparent, and patient-centred medical cannabis system in the UK.
Anything else is just lip service.
