Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will give the Minister of State an example. The Irish Medicines Board reacted very quickly when fake Viagra appeared on the streets. We need the same urgency with these drugs. As the Minister of State knows, the hands of gardaí are tied because these are controlled drugs, and we know that as soon as they are controlled another one will appear. Therefore, there is a need for urgency each time one of these drugs appears. We must ensure the legislation is in place so gardaí can tackle this immediately.

The rehabilitation posts that had been promised through the HSE, which would ensure consistency and quality of service provision, have not appeared. Prevention and education is a particular baby of mine. Again, we do not see enough urgency when it comes to that and to listening to the voices of young people. There is a suggestion that recovery should become the sixth pillar of the national drugs strategy and, again, I hope that will emerge. While we know that harm reduction measures, including medically supervised injecting rooms, on which we had a presentation recently, are a possibility - we hope it will go forward - recovery is still the optimum. I would hope to see that as the sixth pillar.

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