Tackle drugs scourge – but not like this

IN the ongoing and often discouraging war against drugs, there are two radically opposing approaches. The first, the criminal justice model, which prevails in most countries, cracks down on everyone from recreational drug users at the bottom of the chain to the insidious drug suppliers and cartels at the very top.

This hardline approach to individual drug abusers, as opposed to dealers, is a costly burden on the legal system and creates a revolving door of offenders.

The alternative healthcare model, pioneered in Portugal 12 years ago on an experimental basis, decriminalises possession of small quantities of drugs, views addicts as patients, rather than criminals, and seeks to cure the drug scourge through counselling rather than prison sentences.

Fine Gael’s Catherine Byrne’s draft legislation on drug control is inspired by the liberal model but it is a badly conceived and risky strategy that may ultimately destigmatise drug abuse while wreaking havoc in local communities.

She proposes supervised safe places or injection centres for addicts to shoot up, rather than doing so on the streets.

Already the plan has run into trouble. There are fears that the existence of legally recognised drug dens where the new law will make possession of a small amount of heroin legal may oblige gardaí to turn a blind eye to drug possession in their immediate vicinity.

Even Finian McGrath TD, who favours a more lenient approach, has reservations. Those who will pay the heaviest price, however, are not public representatives or gardaí. It is the local community who will have to deal with the social devastation caused by having a State-sanctioned drug ghetto in their backyard.

Merchant’s Quay, the area proposed for the centre, already plays host to an endless cycle of poverty and criminality. Under the new legislation, it will become a powerful magnet for junkies and drug pushers. All this against a backdrop where supports for addiction have yet to be restored to their pre-austerity levels.

There may be no consensus on how a drug-free society can be created but there is wide agreement about the crucial role played by schools, drug treatment and rehabilitation.

Our resources should be channelled into these areas, rather than importing a dubious model from Portugal, which has also failed to produce tangible improvements.