Time to ditch a failing drug policy
Guest author: Danny Kushlick
In calling for the legalisation and regulation of drugs again, chief constable Richard Brunstrom has suggested that aspirin is more dangerous than ecstasy. Whether or not this is the case isn’t clear (apparently the Department of Health could not supply the number of those who die as a result taking aspirin each year). However, as Mary Brett (Europe Against Drugs) tells us in the Mail, “This was an extremely stupid and irresponsible comment. Aspirin is taken as medication to help people get better. Ecstasy is taken to upset the chemical balance of the brain deliberately”. Thanks Mary (she’s a teacher you know).
Commenting on the substance of Brunstrom’s remarks, the Mirror leader said: “Clearly, 40 years of prohibition has been a disaster. Our country is awash with drugs. Criminals are raking in billions… and billions are being wasted on the largely futile “war” on drugs.”
These vastly different views encapsulate precisely the fault lines in the debate on the future of drug policy: one, knocking Brunstrom for having the temerity to question the absolute success of UK (and global) drug prohibition; the other going right to the heart of the matter – prohibition doesn’t work. Indeed, the Mail followed the news piece with a relentless ad hominem attack on Brunstrom, with no analysis of his views on drug policy.
Happily, at least the debate is being kept alive in the media, with some excellent pieces being penned over the last few years. Sadly, the media is the only place where this issue is receiving an airing. For most politicians and Whitehall officials, questioning the status quo on drug policy is taboo (with some surprising exceptions) and the vast majority of NGOs, professional bodies and Government Quangos remain totally silent on the issue. To me it beggars belief that organisations and individuals that work with those most negatively affected by prohibition fail to speak out. That includes: development organisations that work in the drug producer countries, those in prison reform, drug treatment organisations, drug policy think tanks, criminology academics, and the legal field.
Brunstrom suggests that legalisation and regulation will take ten years. Transform is in agreement that this is probably a bare minimum. But in that time, the UK drugs trade will have made £70 billion for gangsters (globally that figure will be over £3 trillion). At the same time, UK families will have paid close to £200 billion of crime costs, either as tax payers or as victims. The illegal trade will have ruined, for another decade, Afghanistan, Colombia, the Caribbean and blighted every major urban environment in industrialised countries.
However, politicians will continue to trot out the “tough on drugs” propaganda for a combination of easy votes and the maintenance of our special relationship with the US. The UK public meanwhile, will continue to be swindled out of billions to support a failed regime. The challenge from the media will not be enough to force politicians to expose prohibition to significant scrutiny and explore alternatives. Those who know the score have a choice - stay silent about the massive social costs of a counterproductive policy that benefits only organised crime and cynical politicians or to speak the truth. Brunstrom’s courage should inspire others to follow his example.
Danny Kushlick is Director of Transform Drug Policy Foundation. Visit www.tdpf.org.uk for more information
A brilliant post. More of this in the Independent please, and less of the Independent on Sunday's stupid Daily Mail stlye anti-drugs drivvell.
Posted by: Angela Phillips | Wednesday, 02 January 2008 at 10:25 PM
As Howard Marks said "there's no such thing as drugs culture, just prohibition culture".
There is no doubting that the war against illegal drugs is being lost and the time has come to try something new.
The argument that free availability of drugs would lead to higher addiction rates is somewhat tenuous. Solvent-based glues are readily accessible, but there has been no uncontrollable epidemic of glue sniffers.
I believe that the vast majority of people will make rational, informed decisions about drug use provided that they are provided with accurate and easy to understand information about any potential consequences.
A legalised and regulated recreational drugs industry would ensure that users could buy drugs with confidence that they would be free from toxic impurities.
The price of drugs would freefall thus reducing the need for addicts to commit crime in order to fund their dependency. The potential benefits of this aspect alone are obvious.
Those that abuse recreational drugs, like those that abuse alcohol, will continue to do so whether they are legal or not.
Having said all of that, the further away from this and any other law enforcement issue that the Mad Mullah of the Traffic Taliban is kept, the better. Brunstrom is a publicity-seeking politico, not a proper police officer. The people of North Wales would be well rid of this particular buffoon.
Posted by: Keith Lonsdale | Wednesday, 02 January 2008 at 11:29 PM
Bravo, both Richard Brunstrom and Danny Kushlick deserve a medal for having the intestinal fortitude to say what they do about the illegal drug issue. The British public should also be thankful they have some major newspapers who are willing to print articles calling for change or at least a public debate. There are none in NZ and we also have the same publicly silent NGOs, parliamentarians and professional bodies, who are perhaps more concerned with status and income to tell the truth. Fortunately for them the majority of the public are too lazy or unable to think critically about why they support those who flush their tax money straight down the toilet into the black market and are happy to swallow the craven 'tough on crime' mantra trotted out at each election.
Posted by: Paula Lambert | Friday, 04 January 2008 at 08:55 AM
Thank you, the Independent, for allowing this debate. As has been said above, it’s so different to the line taken by the Independent on Sunday with its reefer madness outburst. How can two versions of the same paper be so different?
We have just been through a public consultation on the future of drugs policy - not that many people noticed, it was one of the lowest profile consultations ever conducted and something of a sham, with all the questions biased toward supporting the current regime and no discussion of the alternatives allowed. It's perhaps a sign of desperation that the government is so desperate to prevent discussion as the present one is, a sure sign of a failing policy.
Nothing illustrates this better than the language politician’s use: Illegal drugs are not “controlled drugs”, no matter what they tell you. Prohibition means no control over purity or strength, who sells them or to whom and the only requirement to be an illegal drug dealer is unaccountability. If the supply of a substance isn't controlled, the product isn't controlled.
It's time to end prohibition.
Posted by: Derek Williams | Friday, 04 January 2008 at 09:52 AM
Brunstrom's comparison of Ecstasy and aspirin, pay no attention to the psyho active effects of the former. As far as I'm aware aspirin does not have adverse psychological side effects, some six weeks after ingestion.
Dany's put down of Mary Brett, is less than worthy of his talents.
If those who feel ecstasy is as harmeless as aspirin, are so inclined, let them go ahead and use it on a daily basis much in the same way that aspirin is prescribed to avoid among othe things blood clotting.
In the interim period let's stop this nonsense that legalising drugs will reduce criminal activity by those involved in the manufacture and distribution of psycho active drugs. If that were the case there would not be the thriving black market that exists for alcohol and tobacco, not to mention prescription drugs such as benzos and methadone.
Legalisation will come soon enough, it is already occuring by stealth, in substitute and heroin prescribing. We do not need police officers whose job it is to uphold and enforce the law, to advocate it simply because they are too incompetent to clean up their streets.
Posted by: Peter O'Loughlin | Friday, 04 January 2008 at 10:43 AM
I as a drug worker in a charitable trust. The trust is reliant on government money and beholden to the DAT. There is no way that the boss’s would go against the government line of prohibition because they would fear loosing it’s funding. As a worker I cannot be proactive in supporting ending prohibition (which I whole heartedly do) because I would loose my job.
Posted by: chris | Friday, 04 January 2008 at 12:11 PM
Well done Danny and Mr Brunstrom. The Chief Constable's masterful summary of the situation and his proposals for changing the quite dreadful situation we are in was masterful and correct. These truths have now been repeatedly made by many good men and women for at least 12 years now. Yet nothing is done. Why?
The only rational explanation for the polticians' and gutter media's refusal to follow their advice is that they stand to lose something if change is brought about. The illegal drug industry is now one of the world's largest. Perhaps those in power have their sticky fingers in there somewhere? Or is it that they are just political cowards?
Posted by: Mick HUmphreys | Friday, 04 January 2008 at 05:40 PM
Danny & I have debated this ad nauseam. He gets frustrated that he is not winning an unwinnable debate. Legalising currently illegal drugs would not take drugs out of the hands of criminals (as one commentator above remarks). Legalisation with age controls would, as with tobacco & alcohol, make drugs use an even more "desireable adult behaviour" . Criminals would prosper, supplying the younger market, something a "little stronger", counterfeit drugs and even uninvented drugs etc. Just as happens now with tobacco. Illegal suppliers can always undercut legal suppliers-in anything. Criminals just love "use reinforcing substances". The result of legalisation of any illegal drug would be more use and more use equals more TOTAL harm. Danny is being ignored because what he says is not logical. He should not have been unkind to my friend Mary Brett either. Unworthy Danny.
Posted by: David Raynes | Friday, 04 January 2008 at 08:18 PM
Prohibition : Didn't work with alcohol in the USA, it's NOT working with other drugs, so what's the point of prohibition?
Posted by: David Bailey | Sunday, 13 April 2008 at 02:45 PM