Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

I commend Sinn Féin on tabling the motion. The drugs issue is about more than just methadone. The European Union Drug Strategy 2005-2012 outlines a blueprint for a successful drugs strategy, and refers to "an effective and integrated comprehensive knowledge-based system including prevention, early intervention, treatment, harm reduction, rehabilitation and social reintegration." While access to treatment and harm-minimisation are vital features of any drug strategy, they can only form part of a successful strategy.

I will talk about the wider drugs issues here. As Deputy Boyle pointed out last night, the Government regards this as a problem that can be tackled in isolation, which is a very naïve approach to a problem of far-reaching magnitude. Our current drug problem is inextricably linked to the wider issues of marginalisation and the growing disparity between the very rich and the very poor in this country. It is about inequality, poverty and neglect. It is not about absolute poverty but about relative poverty because when the "have-nots" see what the "haves" have it is time to ensure they get their fair share of the wealth of the nation.

Tony Geoghegan of the Merchants Quay project has pointed out that those with no stake in society and no place in education or the jobs market deal in drugs to gain status. It is important that the Government does everything it can to give these people a stake. I represented the south inner city for ten years and I saw the absolute and relative poverty. This Government, the previous one and all governments in the 1990s failed to put the resources and investment into the areas that are crying out for educational assistance, housing and amenities. They are not getting the attention they deserve. They did not get it then and they are not getting it now when we have a huge amount of wealth.

I refer to rehabilitation in our prisons. It is no secret that Ireland's prison system is and has for some time been rife with illegal drugs. The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform recently unveiled a new prison drugs strategy. Bizarrely this new strategy was developed without consulting the national drugs strategy team. The inspector of prisons, Mr. Justice Dermot Kinlen, has condemned the Irish penal system as an utter failure and called on the Minister to implement a radical overhaul of the rehabilitative programmes in our prisons. However, the Minister has refused to consider his suggestions. In rejecting the inspector's call for new rehabilitative approaches such as enhanced family visiting arrangements and prisoner employment programmes, the Minister, Deputy McDowell, is failing to play his part in the war on drugs.

The Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs has estimated that total Government spending on drug treatment and preventive initiatives would be approximately €43 million in 2006 compared with €13.5 million in 2002. However, the increases in the value of drugs seized in recent years have been more impressive. The value of drugs seized in the State has increased fivefold since 2000 to approximately €100 million last year. It is accepted internationally that the authorities seize only approximately 10% of all illicit drugs. This values the drugs trade at approximately €1 billion per year. Increasing fines reflect that the drugs problem is more significant in our society than we thought and that the system of policing is not working.

I refer to drug related violence. Dr. Chris Luke, an accident and emergency department consultant in Cork University Hospital, has more than 20 years' experience and he has witnessed a relentless increase in the number of cocaine users presenting with acute agitation, anxiety and violent tendencies. He says cocaine abuse creates an omnipotent, all knowing, all powerful cruelty, which results in people revelling in gratuitous violence. Unfortunately, we have witnessed the effects of this capacity for cruelty and gratuitous violence over the past six to eight months culminating in the tragic death of Donna Cleary in March. One of the men under suspicion in connection with her death was a chronic abuser of heroin and cocaine and was clearly under the influence of cocaine on the night she was killed.

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