Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I listened to the submissions this morning. It seems a very tortuous route to try to get access to a product. Mr. O'Connor said that in recent years, the use of cannabis products for medical reasons has been an issue of social and political debate in Ireland and abroad and there have been calls for cannabis products to be made available to Irish patients. My understanding is that trying to get this product involves a fairly tortuous route. Those patients believe that these drugs work for them and are transformative. In many cases, they have tried everything else and this is their last hope. I understand people travelling abroad to try to get access, particularly if a child is involved and the parent cannot get access to these products in Ireland. People at home will be asking whether the process needs to be this complicated.

The drug task forces have not appeared before this committee but we know the availability of cannabis, cannabis oil and various different elements of cannabis is widespread. We know that the THC level is 20 times higher than it was only a couple of years ago. Again, this is the information coming from experts. When we are talking about this tiny amount of THC, it reminds me of years ago when I was a kid and when there was a product called ginger beer that supposedly contained alcohol. Some kids thought they would have to drink all these ginger beers but to get a high out of it, you would be drinking ginger beer forever. I understand that it involves the Misuse of Drugs Act but it seems to involve a tiny amount. For people listening at home, THC is supposed to be the element in cannabis that gets you this high. We are talking about a tiny percentage so do we have an idea how much of this cannabis oil would you have to take to supposedly get a high under the current law if we are worried that people will use it willy-nilly as a backdoor to use cannabis in Ireland? Do we, as legislators, need to look at the THC in it? The committee would appreciate it the witnesses could come back to us with an answer today. Do we need to look at this area? I do not have a clue but I know the number of families that have approached us about this. It was their last hope. Is there anything we, as legislators, should be doing for families in that situation regarding the availability of these products? Is there anything we, as legislators, can do about the slow pace of trying to get these products through the system? I accept what the witnesses are saying, namely, that if pharmaceutical companies are not putting them into the system, there will be a difficulty. If there is a significant number of products there, is there anything we or the Minister can do in terms of resources or legislation?

The witnesses mentioned the Minister being in contact with his counterpart in Denmark regarding this issue. Is there a need for the Minister for Justice to talk to her counterparts because of the tortuous route and the difficulty people face trying to get products into Ireland? Would it be useful for this committee to talk to its counterparts in the Netherlands to smooth out some of the difficulties facing those families who are clearly in need of these products but find it extremely difficult to get them?