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THE JURY IS in: The ‘war on drugs’ has failed. It has failed to reduce drug use, failed to make our communities safer, and failed to reduce the harm that people with addictions suffer. In fact, it has made the situation around the world worse.
Our drug policy should reflect simple, shared values. First, we should protect, support and empower those of us who experience trauma, neglect, abuse, serious crime or deprivation. Instead, we punish, stigmatise and exclude people for developing addictions due to terrible circumstances beyond their control.
Second, our justice system should make us safer. Giving people criminal records and prison sentences fails this test by trapping them on a dead end road that prevents their recovery and reintegration as law-abiding citizens. We all suffer from the resulting, and entirely preventable, drug-related crimes and re-offending.
Third, healthcare is a fundamental human need. In a country as rich as Ireland, your ill health should not be a barrier to reaching your full potential. Yet, we dawdle over introducing health services that we know reduce drug-related harm and help people beat addiction.
This is not true for all drugs, of course. If your problem is with alcohol – our national drug of choice – we generally accept that the solution lies in healthcare, not criminalisation.
Some people will always use drugs. And, as we know with alcohol, many adults use some drugs safely. By not recognising this reality, we put our security at risk, while compounding the individual and societal harms caused by addiction and problem drug use.
After decades of knowing we have a serious problem, the best available data suggests that the rate of drug-induced deaths in Ireland remains much higher than the EU average. It is also more than seven times that of Portugal, where drug-related deaths plummeted after decriminalisation in 2001 – while rising across Europe – and remain below the EU average.
While he was the Minister for Health, the current Minister for Justice Simon Harris admitted ‘the war on drugs has not worked.’ Since then, the Government has been theoretically committed to a ‘health-led approach’ to drug use.
However, this is defined in a very limited way. Under the ‘new system,’ Gardaí will refer someone to a HSE ‘health screening and brief intervention’ the first time they are found in possession of drugs for personal use. The second time, Gardaí can offer an Adult Caution, before prosecution follows a third offence.
This doesn’t address the fundamental problems of criminalisation. People with addictions will be caught with drugs more than once, and a ‘brief intervention’ won’t be enough. Prison and criminal records still await those for whom a proper health-led approach should help.
The stigma of criminalisation means that people are unlikely to come forward for treatment. And treatment is limited for those who seek it, with public money wasted on criminal justice responses instead.
This is a far cry from Portugal’s successful approach. Realising that criminalisation simply does not deter use, people receive health interventions without being threatened with prosecution later. This non-adversarial system encourages, rather than hinders, engagement.
Ireland’s National Drugs Strategy calls for a health-led approach. If this is what we want, it is illogical to continue criminalising users.
Still, our Government’s shift in language and tack shows a recognition that we need change and a willingness to take small steps in the right direction. This is crucial at a time when the UK Government doubles down on failed policies of the past – though more and more English police forces refuse to waste time pointlessly chasing and prosecuting people who use drugs.
But inching forward is not enough. Fear of change is no longer a legitimate excuse. We need a paradigm shift.
We need to decriminalise the possession of drugs for personal use.
Fortunately, we can learn from other countries and our own experiences. There are pragmatic solutions to this – if we are brave enough to take the next big step.
Conversations about decriminalisation, legalisation and medical uses are happening globally. We see them in Canada and even in the United States: the country that conceived and led the war on drugs for so long. Colombia and Mexico – two countries that know the costs of that war better than most – are also re-examining this orthodoxy.
Following Portugal, smart governments are setting the ball rolling across Europe. Germany, Luxembourg, Czech Republic and others are working on legal change. Efforts in Norway and Italy have hit political and legal speedbumps, but this only delays the inevitable.
The good news is that in Ireland, too, the tide is turning. We are following France and others in setting up our first supervised injection facility. In Switzerland, these facilities succeeded in reducing overdose-related deaths. Some Swiss facilities even prescribe heroin for on-site consumption – with excellent results for harm reduction.
In December, an Oireachtas Joint Committee on Justice report gave the clearest indication yet that a political consensus could form around decriminalisation in Ireland. This year’s Citizens’ Assembly on Drug Use represents a glorious opportunity for change. Previous Assemblies have helped governments take bold steps on social issues.
In the meantime, the Taoiseach holds his cards close to his chest. But the Government also seeks to use more community sanctions to reduce prison overcrowding and reoffending and endorses projects that create pathways to employment and access to higher education for those with histories of addiction or contact with criminal justice.
As with housing and so many social issues, Ireland is at a crossroads on drug policy. This year can bring national progress. We must have the courage to align our laws with evidence and with our values.
Dr Ian Marder is Assistant Professor in Criminology at Maynooth University School of Law and Criminology. He is an expert in criminal justice reform and seeks to communicate the lessons from this area of research to a wider audience.
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Why do we “need” to?
As I get older and wiser I feel perhaps we should not.
@Madra: because a lot of people enjoy it, their doing no harm to others, alcohol is a lot worse breaking up families, fighting, death many other things,weed is none of the above just sit back take a toke and chill out
@Madra: Because in the past we treated addiction as a moral issue that only weak people succumbed to. Now we know that childhood trauma plays a major part in the development of drug dependency. Mental illness also.
Yes we do need to stop criminalising those who are dependent on drugs to numb their pain. They need healthcare not prison or criminal records!
@Daire Hanrahan: Tell that to the people living with crippling anxiety because of cannabis use in their teens.
@Madra: it’s amazing they want to decriminalise drugs but stop people smoking or drinking alcohol laughable
@Stephen Deegan: one of the benefits of legalisation would be making it more difficult for teenagers to obtain it.
@Stephen Deegan: there’s plenty of people who treat their crippling anxiety with cannabis also, and it is probably easier for teens to obtain it in that context than if it was decriminalised.
@Joey Navinski: If only that were so but sadly its not. Teenagers are the largest category of consumers of drugs. Legalising the sale of drugs to adults will not hinder the supply of drugs to teenagers, it’ll only make drugs more readily available to them as they’ll be able to purchase from the ‘established’ pushers as well as adult buyers of legitimised drugs.
FULL legalisation of weed
@JustBEERbarry: Unfortunate that cannabis gets lumped in with dangerous life-ending narcotics. Flat headers love it as the spark for the imaginary timeline of depravity tho
Enough talk the state has no right to tell me what I can put into my body. It’s a personal freedom issue in my opinion as a non drug user. Decriminalisation though an improvement is a wishy washy half way house pardon the pun.
@Denis O’Kelly: Fine. But the state does have the moral and legal right to prosecute you for acting under the influence of drugs if your behaviour while on drugs endangers or harms others.
@Don Hogan: Genuine interest question, what age are you?
@Don Hogan: conversely, you won’t expect the state (us taxpayers) to deal with the mental and physical health issues as well as provide many drug users with free homes and dole as an income
@Thomas Sheridan: Mummy raised a gem in you didn’t she?
@Don Hogan: Totally agree.
@G Row.: your profile picture says it all.
@G Row.: Do you reply to agist bigots.
@G Row.: Do you reply to agist bigots. Age has nothing to do with good sound public policy.
@Thomas Sheridan: Think you need to read my comment more carefully. Your post has nothing at all to do with my comment.
@G Row.: Childish, offensive comment. Grow up.
@Thomas Sheridan: Your question should be addressed to the supporters of legalising drugs. I would hope the Dail would address this issue if and when they pass legislation to legalise drugs.
Lisbon is no nirvana
@Bri Lyons: Lisdoonvarna was nirvana man.
@Bri Lyons: Kurt Cobain was Nirvana and unfortunately it didn’t end too well for him.
Amazing… Only took 50 years to reach a conclusion that should have been obvious 50 years ago…
Maybe drugs should be free too, people with money don’t need to steal to get cash, making it legal won’t solve the violence associated with it. It might reduce violence between criminals but will do nothing to reduce violence against law abiding citizens.
What foible of human behaviour has ever been cured by the application of punitive sanctions ?
As long as people are not directly harming another person they should be free to do whatever they like in their own homes, but the Zelots will never allow it because they can’t stand the idea that people are of a different opinion in questioning the unknown. “Will it happen in 2023?”… not in Ireland, we are a few generations away from ridding ourselves of the (usually) religiously controlled lantern-jawed masses. Unfortunately.
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