The relative harmfulness of a precursor drug compared to the drug it is used to manufacture is already accounted for in the legislative scheme through the quantity thresholds in Schedule 1 of the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985, and does not separately reduce objective criminality. A sentencing judge may not treat an offender's reluctance to identify co-offenders in drug cases as indicative of lack of remorse, given the well-known reasons for such reluctance. While a sentencing judge is not obliged to accept evidence of remorse from pre-sentence and psychological reports, an affirmative finding that an offender is not truly remorseful requires an evidentiary basis beyond mere scepticism.
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