Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)

My colleague and Labour MEP for Dublin, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, has led the charge - as has rightly been said - on this issue in Ireland for a number of years now and he is continuing to lead the way in Europe.

The most obvious example to follow in a European context is that of Portugal. One thing is crystal clear from the Portuguese example, that is, moving to a health-based and approach away from punishment, reduces serious harms from drug use. Portugal has more than 20 years’ experience under its belt and in the first two decades of this approach, it saw deaths from drug use and incidents of HIV tumble, as well as a fall in prison the population. In 1999, it saw 369 people lose their lives due to overdose. By 2016, that figure had tumbled to just 30. HIV diagnoses due to drug injection also fell dramatically over the same period. In 2000, there were 907 such diagnoses, falling to just 18 in 2017.

Another benefit to this approach to drug use will be to reduce the pressure on prison places. As long as the change in policy is matched by multi-annual resourcing of health and addiction services and supports for people who use drugs, we have a chance here to take a transformational approach to drug use and make a meaningful reduction in the harm caused by drugs.

The endless Garda hours used chasing people who use drugs can be turned on those who profit from the misery caused by the sale and trafficking of drugs. The citizens' assembly has done tremendous work on this issue. Recommendation 17 from its report argues for the introduction of a “comprehensive health-led response to possession of drugs for personal use." While possession of controlled drugs would remain illegal, people found in possession of illicit drugs for personal uses would be afforded “extensive opportunities to engage voluntarily with health-led services”, the citizens' assembly recommendation explained.

For this policy to work, the citizens' assembly laid out the supports that need to be in place in the following recommendation, that is, recommendation 18. It says very clearly:

Government should allocate significant additional funding on a multi-annual basis to drugs services across the statutory, community and voluntary sectors, to address existing service gaps, including in the provision of community-based and residential treatment services, to support the implementation of the recommendations of the Citizens’ Assembly.

Quite frankly, this has not been the case and has not been so for successive governments. Without that funding, any policy change will be set up to fail. The services are already in place on the ground in many communities but by God they are stretched. They need certainty and multi-annual funding. Services like Red Door in my hometown of Drogheda provide vital support to those in addiction and are ready - they stand ready, willing and able - to do more if given the resources to do so and if we can introduce the kind of transformational change we need in drugs policy in this country to support people who need it most.

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