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_POSTED_BY desik
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Wednesday, 30 July 2008 |
 hard to digest by autotelic The UK Drug Policy Commission (UKDPC) has published a report critical of UK law enforcements supply side drugs strategy . The Commission which looked at the cost and effectiveness of UK drugs policy , found that:
The UK illicit drug market generates £5.3 billion in trade and poses the single greatest organised crime threat to the UK.
About one-quarter of the total cost of delivering drug strategy has been dedicated to reducing supply (£380 million in 2005/06).
Drug markets are extremely resilient to supply side enforcement , are highly fluid and adapt to law enforcement interventions, with drugs and suppliers taken out of circulation being easilly and speedilly replaced.
While the availability of controlled drugs is restricted by definition, it appears that additional enforcement efforts had had little adverse effect on the availability of illicit drugs in the UK.
The available evidence suggests that street-level drug law enforcement should focus on forging productive local partnerships and not rely solely on police crackdowns.
The authors were unable to locate any comprehensive published UK evidence of the relative effectiveness of different enforcement approaches. They were also not able to identify any published comparative cost-benefit or value-for-money analysis for different interventions within the UK.
Enforcement can have a significant and unintended negative impact on the nature and extent of harms associated with drugs and this should be recognised and minimised.
The last point is the kicker as what the Commission,an independent body set up to objectively analyse and influence UK drugs policy and public understanding, is effectively saying is that cracking down on suppliers is actually making the drugs problems worse and we need to acknowledge this and focus on a meaningful drugs policy that reduces rather than generates drugs related violence and crime.
The police are going to read this report as a counsel of despair, they are effectively being told the war on drugs is unwinnable but its the politicians who need to act on this report and be brave enough to recognise that we need to legalise all drug usage without delay as its clearly the current criminalisation of drug use that's responsible for the crime.
Rather than burying this report or leaving discussion of it to the experts and bureaucrats we all have an opportunity to get real and have an open discussion about drug usage here as the £5.3 billion UK drugs market - or its US equivalent - is not going to go away just because we basically disapprove of people getting stoned on various substances . Similarly , law enforcement can form as many local partnerships as they like but it isnt going to change the fact that there is, always has been and always will be a demand for mind altering substances from the curious, jaded and young.
Some people like getting stoned.Its a personal preference and a human need , its as simple as that and much as policy and attitudes towards pornography have changed in recent years from almost self righteous paranoid hysteria to a healthier acceptance that we actually like sex and can get off on watching other people fuck so our attitudes to drugs need to change. Legitimise and socialise the drugs market, let people take drugs and wrest the market away from the criminals, lets stop trying to be more responsible for what other people digest than they are, let them eat soma I say , just make sure they form an orderly queue and pay for it so the £5.3 billion gets put to better use than enriching criminals and corrupting law enforcement officials and Governments. .
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Last Updated ( Friday, 01 August 2008 )
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