PORTUGAL POLICE WON'T ARREST DRUG TAKERS

The Pitfalls Of A Radical New Approach To Addiction

THE sight of Nick, a backpacker from Blackburn, sprawled on a Lisbon
street corner with enough heroin in him to anaesthetise a horse is a
poor advertisement for Portugal's new tolerant drugs regime.

Nick, 19, mumbles that he learnt about the change from a website. Two
policemen who witness his collapse are not sure what to do with him,
as from this week they have been told not to arrest anyone found
taking any kind of drug.

Some in the police force call this madness. Portugal's leaders
describe themselves as revolutionary and say this is tough justice,
while Nick and thousands like him think the country has become a soft
touch. The fear of many Portuguese is that their holiday resorts will
become a dumping ground for drug addicts.

Already the British Embassy in Lisbon is fielding calls from
youngsters fancying a package tour to the Algarve and inquiring if
drugs are now legal. They are not, says Vitalino Canas, Portugal's
drug enforcer. It is just that those caught taking drugs will never
go to jail. The niceties of decriminalisation and legalisation are
lost on the likes of Nick, who boasts that he is going to stay,
smoking heroin, until his money runs out.

Senhor Canas, who as Secretary of State for the Presidency of the
Council of Ministers pioneered the new law, admits there is a risk
but says someone had to try something new.

"For years Britain, America, everyone, has operated zero tolerance,
spent billions on law enforcement and for what? There are more
addicts than ever." He said politicians had spent the past three
years selling this message, but admitted: "If it goes horribly wrong
in the next six months then we will be out on our ear."

The law provides for "shooting rooms", where heroin users can inject
themselves with impunity, but it is up to local authorities to
provide them and, understandably, none wants to be the first.

There was a near riot last week in a northern town when local rumour
wrongly suggested that a doctor's surgery was to be turned into one.

Senhor Canas said: "Police should concentrate on hammering drug
traffickers while we help consumers" (as he calls addicts). "Surely
we realise by now jails are not the place for drug takers, so let's
use some imagination."

From his office window he can see the winding street of Casal
Ventosa, where at any time of the day you will find addicts touting
and taking drugs just a ten-minute drive from the tourist heart of
Lisbon.

Leaning on his van, one officer watches as a woman asks her young son
to hold her bags of shopping while she fishes in her purse to buy
heroin from a dealer. Two other men jostle her, offering her tinfoil
and other drugs paraphernalia.

"Welcome to Lisbon's drugs supermarket," the officer says with a
resigned shrug. You find all nationalities shopping here alongside
those from Lisbon's wealthier suburbs, such as the suntanned couple
who stop their sports car on the corner and saunter over to buy that
evening's drug.

There are no guns in Casal Ventosa, one officer says reassuringly as
he deftly raises his riot shield to deflect a well-aimed brick. The
preferred weapon is the syringe. Few want to risk being stabbed with
an infected needle, so there are easy pickings for street robbers.

Anyone caught taking anything from Ecstasy to cocaine faces a
psychiatrist and social worker, not a judge. Anyone with up to ten
days' supply is presumed to be a "consumer".

Eighteen commissions have been set up, but nobody can agree how they
should operate. The commission headquarters in Lisbon has the feel of
a doctor's surgery, with blue upholstered chairs, racks of magazines
and soft lighting, which its president, Maria Antonia Almeida Santos,
says is how it should be.

"I am not here to judge," Dr Santos, 39, says as she waits for the
day's "customers". The commission refers drug takers to
rehabilitation clinics. Critics say there are only 300 places and the
175 million UKP budget for the rest of this year cannot immediately solve
that.

Habitual offenders could face community service or, at worst, a fine
of 180 UKP. Ask if there are times when a drug taker must be jailed and
Dr Santos and her team shake their heads furiously.

Paulo Portas, leader of the opposition right-wing Christian
Democratic Party, says: "There will be planeloads of students heading
for the Algarve to smoke marijuana and take a lot worse, knowing we
won't put them in jail. We promise sun, beaches and any drug you
like."