Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Finian McGrath covered a couple of the questions I was going to ask. I would have had a different view until I went to Portugal. For all of the flaws that were pointed out to us in Portugal by the different people who presented to us, the general theme overall was that moving it into health was the appropriate thing to do. We are now in an election cycle so we need to look at initiating the debate, as Mr. Carey quite rightly said. The time is right. Drug use is a nationwide phenomenon, not just an urban phenomenon. I come from a rural part of a mainly rural constituency and I know that many of my neighbours use drugs on a recreational basis and I certainly would not consider them criminals. I embrace the debate and think a mature and sensible approach will come out of our discussions as a committee. When the national debate takes off, hopefully, we will adopt a sensible approach to dealing with the misuse of drugs.