David Norris (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State. She is committed in this area, she has a track record and she is someone who actually will do something about it. It is an extraordinary situation. In the Victorian period, people took drugs all over the place and laudanum was rampant. It was at the instigation of the pharmaceutical industry that all this criminalisation came in. I want to fly a flag. I am in favour of the decriminalisation of drugs. I have campaigned on this issue for 30 years. The Portuguese example has been quoted. It is stunning what has happened there. Some 90% of the involvement of the authorities is now treatment and only 10% policing. That is a wonderful record. There were 80 deaths in 2001 but, since the decision was taken, there were just 16 in 2012. The number of heroin addicts in Portugal has halved. That is something we need to look at.

We cannot simply deal with the addicts, however. We have to deal with the supply side as well. So long as the supply side keeps going, we are going to have the involvement of criminal gangs. I am not in favour of decriminalisation so that everyone in the country should get high. I am in favour of it because drugs are the motivating factor for the overwhelming majority of criminal activity in this country. That is why this should stopped.

There was a commitment in A Programme for a Partnership Government for "a health-led rather than a criminal justice approach to drug use". This is the right way to look at it. The Global Commission on Drug Policy has stated that the criminalisation of drug use and possession has little or no impact on levels of drug use. That is a fact. The amount of drug use in this country is quite astonishing. Some 26.4% of Irish adults aged 15 years or older report using an illegal drug in their lifetime, 7.5% within the past 12 months and 4% in the past month. Lifetime usage of cannabis at 24% is considerably higher than any other form of drugs. Therefore, there is a very considerable amount of drug taking in this country.

I congratulate Senator Ruane on the production of the Bill, as well as Senator Ó Ríordáin. I remember Senator Ó Ríordáin, when he was Minister of State, speaking in this House on this issue. I am very glad it is called the Controlled Drugs and Harm Reduction Bill. That is what we should be interested in, not criminalisation or penalising people for what is essentially an illness. What we should be doing is ensuring people have access to rehabilitation. This is one of the most important features of the Bill and it is quite visionary.

The Bill has been gone through to some extent. We note that it decriminalises the possession of small amounts for personal use but continues the capacity to prosecute drug users. In this regard, we should look also at the mandatory sentence of ten years. Some of the big drugs suppliers use eejits as drug mules. If they are caught with an amount of drugs, they are imprisoned automatically for ten years. It should be the real criminals who are targeted. It is splendid that there is a drug dissuasion service intended to manage people out of the situation. It is a very caring Bill. While I will not go through all its provisions, I want to highlight section 20 which refers to a drug awareness programme, a drug rehabilitation programme and a community engagement programme. At subsection (2), it states that the case officer can exercise his or her discretion and not refer someone to a programme if there is a feeling it is not appropriate.

There is quite a lot of unanimity in this area, particularly on the Joint Committee on Justice and Equality which looked at this situation and issued a report. No. 1 in the report states, "The Committee strongly recommends the introduction of a harm reducing and rehabilitative approach". Let us note the word "strongly". It is not just recommending, it is strongly recommending, and it points to the Portuguese example. As I said, the Minister of State at the time, now Senator Ó Ríordáin, made a speech in February 2016 in the London School of Economics where he spoke in terms of decriminalisation.I have received a large number of emails from people who strongly support this Bill. Some of them are repetitive and it is obvious that there is some kind of a programme but I welcome that because lobbying is part of the political function.

The Bill proposes to decriminalise the possession of controlled drugs for personal use and to establish a drug dissuasion service. It provides for harm reduction measures for those found in possession of drugs, including drug awareness. One of the striking aspects of the correspondence I received on this matter is the large number of doctors who contacted me. I have here a copy of an email from a doctor whose name, in deference to the House, I will not use. He writes, "Treating patients of addiction as criminals will someday be viewed as a violation of human rights." He is absolutely right. He also states that criminalising patients, "has never been shown to help". This is a doctor who knows what the circumstances are. Another doctor, whose name I will also replace with a blank, writes, "I have worked in addiction services for over 25 years and I believe this Bill, if passed, will be the greatest step forward for Ireland and for its substance users/misusers in the history of drugs legislation." That is an extraordinary statement to make. It is remarkable that somebody who entered the Seanad at the previous election has produced such historic legislation.

Another doctor, whose name I will also leave blank and who works in Beaumont Hospital's psychiatric service, wrote to me expressing total support for the Bill. Another correspondent, this time one who is not a doctor, writes:

I am a father, husband, brother, uncle and an addict in recovery a very long time. I am a Master’s student of the Dublin Institute of Technology and a professionally qualified social worker.

This again is testament from the coalface.

I understand the reasons the Bill will not be pressed and we will adjourn the debate to allow for consideration of further reports and discussion with the Minister and her advisers to enable a more excellent Bill to be produced. That is what the Oireachtas is about, namely, putting down forward-looking legislation, while accepting that there must be co-operation and dialogue between the proposer of the Bill and the Minister responsible and her advisers and civil servants. This is a good day for Seanad Éireann and I am honoured to have been allowed to speak in the debate on this welcome Bill.