Ms Niamh Eastwood:

Yes, absolutely. The increase in treatment numbers did not result from mandatory referral to treatment or referral to the dissuasion commission. It was very much people accessing treatment because they felt they could come forward and there was investment in the services to allow them to come forward.

Portugal was starting from almost zero in that context. Ireland is ahead in that respect. The Deputy said we could not decriminalise today. That is predicated on the idea that there needs to be a health diversion for everybody who is caught in possession of drugs. The vast majority of people who will be subject to a criminal sanction will be cannabis users or people who are dependent. What we can do is to give them the information about where to go. People do not have to be referred and it does not, and should not, be mandatory because, as the Deputy said, services are already stretched and the idea of putting unnecessary additional pressure on those services when people do not need them is not a good use of public resources.

One thing about Portugal that we have not mentioned so far is that it did a cost-benefit analysis of decriminalisation. It was published in 2015. In the first ten years of decriminalisation, there was a saving of 18% in social costs, which included savings for the health system as people's health issues to do with blood-borne viruses, BBVs, or other health morbidities were dealt with. There were also savings in the criminal justice system. In the long term, decriminalisation is a cost benefit to the state. That conclusion has been repeated in other countries. I am conscious that we have spent a lot of time discussing Portugal but Spain also decriminalised drugs. It did so in the 1980s, long before Portugal did so. Spain decriminalised possession and social supply, which allows for cannabis social clubs. In that context, we have seen none of the harms to, or pressures on, services in the same way. There are many models from which we could share evidence with the committee. I hope that answers the Deputy's questions.