Tackling drug use ‘requires a health-led strategy’

DRUGS possession for personal use in Ireland should be met with a health response, rather than a criminal justice response, the Citizens’ Assembly on Drugs Use has recommended.

The group said that while possession of illicit drugs should remain illegal, those found in possession should first be given ‘extensive opportunities to engage voluntarily with health-led services’.

It said such an approach would ‘potentially completely remove the possibility of criminal conviction and prison sentences for simple possession’. It is one of a number of recommendations in the assembly’s final report, published yesterday.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has previously said he will give ‘careful consideration’ to any recommendations to reform our drugs laws in the report.

The assembly, chaired by former HSE chief Paul Reid, compiled the report after being tasked by the Oireachtas with considering the legislative, policy and operational changes the country could make to significantly reduce the harmful impacts of illicit drugs on society.

It held a number of public meetings between April and October 2023.

The report said: ‘The State would respond to drug use and misuse primarily as a public health issue rather than as a criminal justice issue. While possession of controlled drugs would remain illegal, people found in possession of illicit drugs for personal use would be afforded, first and foremost, extensive opportunities to engage voluntarily with health-led services.’

Mr Reid added: ‘We can’t keep doing things the way we are.’

Hildegarde Naughton, Minister of State for Public Health, Wellbeing and the National Drugs Strategy, said: ‘Government is committed to taking a health-led approach to the issue of illicit drugs, a position which is endorsed by this report.’