NO: ENABLING DRUG USE ERODES MORAL AUTHORITY

Whatever Happened To The Idea Of Government As A Moral Force In Society

City of Ottawa staff have expanded the list of drug paraphernalia they hand
out to illegal drug users, to include pipe parts used to smoke crack
cocaine. Last week Police Chief Vince Bevan objected, saying he fears that
handing out crack kits will only enable users.

Public health officials are aiming to do good work. Clean drug
paraphernalia, which doesn't cost much, doesn't spread disease the way
dirty equipment does. An addict's health can be ruined through infection
with HIV or hepatitis C, and cost the health system a lot of money.

Those are strong practical arguments. But they leave an important question
of principle untouched.

When did it become OK for government to tax people so that it can even
spend small amounts of money handing out equipment for an illegal activity?
And what kind of message are we sending to youth when public officials are
supplying equipment for the consumption of illegal drugs?

Addiction is a bedeviling problem in Canada. It's such a scourge in
Vancouver that the city set up a shooting room for safer intravenous drug
use. Ottawa's public health department has a van that delivers clean
needles to the homes of addicts at night, seven days a week, and tries to
recover whatever used needles it can.

On the tough, old problem of alcohol, the Shepherds of Good Hope in Ottawa
has a controlled drinking program that permits alcohol, so that at least
consumption is moderated.

If community addiction agencies wish to do these things, as long as the
activity has legal sanction, let them. If the donors to agencies wish to
support such programs, they may open their wallets wide.

Government paving the way for illegal activity, though, makes no sense to
taxpayers who believe government must always uphold the law, and change the
law when it doesn't make sense. If you really believe consumption of crack
cocaine is all right, make it legal.

Canada's drug policies are a mish-mash. Marijuana is still illegal to use
but the federal government is spending millions to grow it, for medicinal
use. Illegal drug use consumes an extraordinary amount of time and money in
the justice system. In the case of soft drugs, the hunt for those who smoke
a few joints has needlessly ruined people's lives in the past.

But what are people to make of a crack cocaine court case where the
equipment evidence in a drug bust is supplied by government?

And where will government's helping hand end, when some government
officials and international addiction specialists recommend prescribing
pure heroin to hard-care addicts?

We are creating public confusion about what government stands for. Then
again, government's shaky handle on its ethical role has been eroding for
many years.

In Ontario, government has become a huge gambling enterprise, running
lotteries and casinos when it's obvious at casinos and corner stores that
many of the people who gamble cannot afford to. The Centre for Addiction
and Mental Health says 449,000 Ontarians are problem gamblers and, among
serious gamblers, one in five has contemplated suicide.

Government has the monopoly on liquor sales when there's much evidence --
on display daily at the Elgin Street courthouse -- to show booze causes a
ship load of misery. Government can't stay solvent without billions from
booze and gambling.

If soft drugs and prostitution are legalized -- some people advocate
prostitution zones in cities -- it wouldn't be a big surprise if government
sold these "goods and services," of course adding GST and provincial sales
tax as the house cut.

The laissez-faire attitude in government is that people are going to use
prostitutes, illegal drugs and gamble anyhow. All we do is accommodate it
and try to at least reduce the harm.

We Could Do Better.

Government needs to define clearly what it does and what it doesn't do with
a keen eye to the ethical optics. To me, that would mean working hard to
advance public health: educating teenagers about avoiding sexually
transmitted diseases would be a classic example. Helping people off drugs
that destroy their lives would be another. Government is supposed to show
leadership in the community. Part of that task is to inform people about
the life-changing health effects of alcohol and drug abuse. It shouldn't be
inevitable that drug use is going to increase. It shouldn't be impossible
to keep prostitution out of neighbourhoods.

When moving from promoting public health -- and beating addictions -- to
enabling addictive or illegal activity, the line is drawn. There would be
some things, like drug use and prostitution, that government would have no
part of. Government might regain some moral authority.