Published Letter: NO DRUG SUCCESS
Pubdate: Monday January 08, 2001
Source: Oldham Evening Chronicle (UK)
Website:
Note: The Oldham Chronicle allows pen names if the author sends their full name and address
NO DRUG SUCCESS
You have to wonder just what the drug tsar, Keith Hellawell, has been smoking when he claims that the government's anti-drug effort is working (Jan 4th). I would hardly call an increase, albeit small, in the number of schoolchildren trying cannabis to be evidence of a successful drug policy.
According to last years annual report from the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, Britain has more cannabis users than any other country in Europe and more problem drug users per capita of any major European country bar Italy. Some success.
Britain also arrests more people for possessing cannabis than anywhere else in Europe, an ongoing witch-hunt that costs us, the taxpayers, tens of millions of pounds each year. Truly a waste of scarce police resources. The Millenium Dome was money well spent in comparison.
Still, what can we expect from a government that seeks to emulate the failed zero tolerance policies of the U.S. while ignoring the success of the cannabis policies on our own doorstep in Holland, where 25 years of regulated decriminalisation has resulted in lowered drug use and death rates that puts the punitive Blair/Hellawell policy to shame.
GO DUTCH
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