Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Thursday, 3 October 2024
Committee on Drugs Use
A Health-Led Approach: Discussion (Resumed)
9:30 am
Dr. Barry Cullen:
On early interventions, there was the opiate epidemic in the eighties, which continued into the nineties and began to phase out afterwards. One of the reasons it phased out was that there was a massive injection in local communities, especially into young people's services. The young people's services and facilities fund was set up, and by the time a new service was set up for the treatment of people under the age of 18 with opiate problems, led by Bobby Smyth, it had no clients. Nobody under the age of 18 presents with opiate addiction nowadays, and in respect of methadone maintenance, the numbers are falling, not increasing, as they previously were. That investment worked but, unfortunately, it was pulled.
On where we should start, I will deal with the decriminalisation aspect first because of the Senator's question. I fully agree with Mr. Mullins. Decriminalisation is yet another example of us believing we are doing something but not really doing it, because we are missing the point. There will be discretionary application of decriminalisation that will, in my view, be class based. That is the reality.
We need to start somewhere with regulation, and I would start with cannabis for the simple reason other countries are doing it. That is what we need to home in on-----
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