A NORTH-EAST politician who lost his child to epilepsy is calling on the Government to “act now” to legalise medicinal cannabis.

Middlesbrough’s MP Andy McDonald has written to the Home Secretary Sajid Javid urging him to allow legal prescriptions of medicinal cannabis oil.

This week, Mr McDonald questioned whether his son Rory, who died at 16 in 2006, “would be with us now” if cannabis oil had been available to him.

Lending his support to the high-profile campaign to change the law, Mr McDonald called on the Government to implement a blanket exemption on the use of cannabis oil to help those struggling with illnesses like epilepsy.

Sajid Javid recently told the House of Commons that he will consider evidence for giving the drug on prescription and said it was "time to review the scheduling of cannabis."

Mr McDonald took to social media and said: “As a parent who lost a son to intractable epilepsy, I’m speaking out in the hope that further deaths can be avoided and families are spared the pain of losing a child.”

He added: “Cannabis oil works – we don’t need another Government review, we need them to take action now.”

Mr McDonald was speaking in the wake of a decision from the Home Office to grant licences for use of the banned substance to treat 12-year-old Billy Caldwell and six-year-old Alfie Dingley, whose families campaigned tirelessly for change.

Their plight prompted the Government to create an expert panel to look into individual cases, though many campaigners say a case-by-case approach is not appropriate.

Darlington’s MP Jenny Chapman said: “It’s not reasonable to expect families on a case by case basis to apply for a special license when they have desperately ill children to care for.

“There needs to be a way of managing the prescription and supervising the use of cannabis oil in the same way as other drugs.”

Michael Fisher, the founder of Teesside Cannabis Club, said: “This is the biggest step forward in all of my years campaigning.

“There’s still a long way to go but this has brought to everyone’s attention just how many people are suffering.

“There are millions of us that are having to use unsafe and unregulated oil – this is a step forward but by no means is this war over.”