Matt Shanahan (Waterford, Independent)
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I thank our guests for attending but I have found this debate a bit depressing. I have three teenage children and I hoped, as part of this committee, we would figure out how to interdict young people using drugs into the future. A lot of the talk today seems to have been, and I think it was Ms Lawlor who mentioned it, that the rate of drug taking among young people is rising and that is just where we are going. Will the initiatives being discussed here actually interdict that? I have not heard that. We are trying to talk about reducing harm and we all want to do that. I would say it is a significant harm not interdicting children to become drug dependent in the future and I am not sure we are addressing that.

I have a few questions for Professor Stevens. Portugal has been mentioned a number of times, and the metrics that they are seeing in terms of decriminalisation. What is the overall rate of growth? What is the trend in drug usage across Portugal? Is Portugal an outlier compared with the rest of the European countries or is it the same? Where does it sit?