Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Independent)

I congratulate the Seanad for adopting a unanimous stance. A sensible approach has been taken by all Members.

Senator Feeney referred to head shops as being a plague on society. That is certainly an appropriate way to describe what they do. However, if it were possible to simply bring forward legislation to ban products such as snow, blow, ice or charge plus, we could have it this evening. Unfortunately, it is not as simple as that, which is where the difficulty arises.

We banned the sale of magic mushrooms in 2006, following a meeting I had had with the family of the late Mr. Colm Hodkinson. I will never forget that meeting during which I saw how troubled, devastated and upset that family were. Last year we banned BZP. As we ban these substances, small variations are made and, suddenly, there is a new product. That is the significant difficulty we face.

In the United Kingdom legislation was brought forward on 23 December last. We will have legislation ready within one month. Four regulations are required. There is a small team sitting behind me - there are three persons present, one of whom comes from the office of the Minister of State, Deputy Curran - which includes the chief pharmacist. This is only a small part of the wide responsibilities of the team. Discussions were held recently with the pharmaceutical industry and the team will have the regulations ready for the Government in approximately four weeks. We will then have to notify the European Commission, a process which takes three months. I note the United Kingdom did not notify the Commission, but we are advised that notification is required and that if one does not notify the Commission where one is required to do so, it could make the regulations invalid. Clearly, we want to ensure we follow the legal advice on notification. That being the case, we should have the law in place in Ireland, having notified the European Union, by June this year.

We must ensure we define by chemical compound what it is we are banning because many of the substances are legitimate and used in the legitimate pharmaceutical industry, as well as the plastics industry. For example, the products trazodone and nefazodone are legally used. In the United Kingdom they did not ban what is commonly known here as snow which, I think, is known as mephedrone. We hope to ban it. The reason for the difficulty is that many of these substances have legitimate uses.

I have never been in a head shop and I am unsure if I have ever seen one, except on television. However, I understand they vary from big emporiums that sell various bizarre products to mainstream herbal shops where, among other things, sell these highly dangerous products that are effectively killing people - there is no doubt about that. They are targeted at vulnerable and young people especially. They have no role in our society.

I was very taken by the recent comments of Dr. Luke from Cork. I am unsure whether he works in Cork University Hospital, CUH, or the Mercy University Hospital.