Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

I agree with the previous speaker that there is a crisis. The misuse of drugs in society is a challenge but this Government is not giving the issue the treatment and attention it deserves. Drug use is a challenge to Fianna Fáil but, more important, it is a major challenge to the ideology of the Progressive Democrats because the State must intervene. It is not about regulations; it is about strong intervention from the State to tackle the drugs problem. It is also about providing the rehabilitation, programmes and policing that are required and about making a substantial long-term investment in the communities in which drugs are used. That includes the socially excluded and disadvantaged areas and those parts of Dublin in particular where there is a very high prevalence of drug use.

The current drugs programmes cost approximately €40 million per year. We are spending more than that on the advertising of alcohol. If this Government is to get real about the drugs problem, one of the first actions it could take would be to ban the advertising of alcohol, and not just in certain areas, because there is an obvious link between the advertising of alcohol and people taking their first faltering steps towards a lifetime of addiction. In particular, I would single out the association between alcohol advertising and sport because as we know, the main killer drugs are alcohol and cigarettes and unless we seriously tackle those two issues we are not doing enough about the drugs problem. I want the Government to take the initiative and ban alcohol advertising. It should also put health warnings on alcohol products.

On the problem of heroin, as the motion suggests we need stronger community policing, better supervision of the ports in and out of Ireland and additional funding to ensure we have the resources to tackle this problem but we also must reflect the changing patterns throughout Europe and the world. For example, we must allow for the provision of clean needles in our prisons. We must assure prisoners who are at very high risk of contracting HIV that the needles they use will be clean. The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform is putting his head in the sand on that issue. A carefully constructed report in which the Irish Penal Reform Trust was involved stated clearly that we should make available clean needles and injecting rooms in our jails.

The Minister of State with responsibility for this area should be someone with more clout rather than a Minister who must deal with the housing issue one day and the drugs issue the next day. The Minister of State with responsibility for the drugs issue must get real. His latest plan to provide a bus to bring drug users from the centre of Dublin to the docklands is ridiculous. Does he expect that heavy drug users will line up at a bus stop waiting for the shuttle bus to bring them to a relocated Merchant's Quay project in the docklands? The Minister of State insults the office he holds by making such ridiculous suggestions. I understand where the Minister is coming from. He wants to address the problem of drug dealing and drug use in the centre of our city but what he must do is address the social inequality, the lack of decent housing, decent sports facilities, open space, parental care and family support. All those supports must be put in place; this cannot happen through the trickle of funding that has come into these areas over the past five or ten years. It is about a determined effort to address the inequality and the disadvantage in those areas, whether it be in Dublin, Dún Laoghaire or the towns and cities throughout the country.

The Green Party supports the motion before the House. We believe the issue of drug abuse must receive greater attention from the Government. It should not be a shared portfolio for the Minister of State. We must also re-evaluate our controls over alcohol, which is one of the main killer drugs in society today.

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