FOCUS ON DRUGS SWITCHING TO DEMAND REDUCTION

NEXT week the Maastricht Treaty will be popping up in a way that many might
never expect.

For the first time it identified drugs prevention as a European public
health priority and provided a legal base for the European Commission to
propose and develop a Community policy on drugs.

That plan was approved and adopted by the European Parliament and the
Council of Ministers with a budget of almost IEP22 million for the five
years 1995-1999 inclusive.

Next week along with all the other member states Ireland will participate
in an EU sponsored European Drug Prevention Week.

The emphasis on prevention was endorsed at international level in June at a
special session of the United Nations General Assembly. For the first time
equal importance was given by the international community to demand
reduction as has been traditionally given to the interdiction of illegal
drug supplies.

Demand reduction aims, through education, dialogue and professional
services, to prevent the use of drugs and to reduce the adverse
consequences of drug abuse. It tries to introduce drug users and abusers to
supportive environments at community level, aiming in particular at groups
at risk, for example HIV positive addicts. And most of all to get young
people especially to think first.

Arriving at a co-ordinated European approach on drugs policy has been and
remains an extremely sensitive issue. It rests on trying to strike a
balance between reducing the demand for drugs, such as next week's
campaign, and reducing the supply of drugs by fighting organised crime.

Achieving such balance is no easy task in the context of fundamental
differences of approach and opinion between member states, sometimes even
between cities or regions within member states, as to what constitutes the
best approach to the drugs problem.

Recently, I chaired a discussion in the Liberal Group in the European
Parliament on drugs policy. As ever it revealed a deep divide in opinions
on how best to proceed. In general my Dutch colleagues emphasised
prevention but liberalisation while my Swedish colleagues bought prevention
but baulked at the liberalisation of soft drugs policy.

These cultural differences run deep and require policy makers at European
and international level to show a genuine respect for cultural diversity.

While the European Parliament has no legislative power over member state
policy in the fight against drugs we have been presented from time to time
with political resolutions that have forced us to take a stand. Somewhat
like my Swedish colleagues I have generally erred on the conservative side
of this debate, fearing that wider access to a liberalised soft drugs
regime could act as a gateway to drug addiction and to the abuse of harder
drugs.

Though not one of the reforming liberalisers on this issue I appreciate
that theirs is a case not without force.

A recently published UN world report on drugs suggests that the drugs trade
currently accounts for 8% of total world trade. If so, this is bigger than
the entire world trade in iron and steel and as large as global commerce in
textiles. The authors of the report suggested that in order to
significantly reduce profit margins in heroin and cocaine to the point
where it would not be worth the candle then at least 75% of the illicit
drugs trade involved would need to be seized.

The current UN estimate is that less than 30% of illegal drugs are seized
annually.

Though significant the seizures globally are too small to have a real
impact while the cost of policing and enforcement necessitated by this
clamp down is extremely high. I have seen one report that suggests about
half of all the inmates serving sentences in European prisons today are
held in relation to drug related crime.

Whether one wants to re-write the rules of the game or to hold the line in
respect of decriminalising soft drugs, in the fight against drugs the
evidence is overwhelming that despite the best policing efforts the problem
remains pervasive.

The emphasis on prevention commends itself as a fundamental priority
whatever school of thought one belongs to. On this consensus rests the
basis for the European Drug Prevention Week.

The Irish experience very much reflects international trends. In the past
fortnight the Garda National Drug Unit seized 22 kilograms of pure heroin.
After the dealers would have cut the drug and added soluble powder to bulk
it up it is estimated that the bagged contents could have provided up to
750,000 deals on the street. At up to IEP20 a deal this could have netted
up to IEP15 million. The extraordinary thing is that in spite of this
massive seizure it has been reported that the street price of heroin in
Dublin has shown no tendency to rise, suggesting that addicts can still
access a plentiful supply.

The annual report of An Garda Siochana for 1997 delivers the most
comprehensive recent law enforcement picture for Ireland. That year 7,480
people were prosecuted either for the supply or possession of controlled
drugs and 2,355 convictions were obtained. Cannabis accounted for 66% of
the cases, heroin for 10%, ecstasy 6% and cocaine for 3% of the total drugs
seized.

Conscious no doubt both of the worth and limits of their enforcement
exercise the gardai are also prominent in the prevention campaign. In 1997
they participated in more than 2,300 drug lectures around the country and
clearly recognise that prevention is better than cure. The human and health
problems associated with drug abuse are so complex that they themselves are
part of the problem. Social impoverishment, economic exclusion and
marginalisation push a lot of people towards the drugs habit as a way of
coping and escaping.

But this is also a problem whose devastating consequences respect no social
bounds. One also finds among more prosperous social classes a significant
drugs problem driven by curiosity, peer pressure, a kind of prosperity
fatigue and trendy fashion.

Tomorrow, the Minister for Health will launch European Drug Prevention Week
in Tallaght, guided by a multi-disciplinary national steering committee.
More than 150 primary schools and over 700 secondary schools will
participate in next week's campaign. Obtuse and arcane as European treaty
making may appear to be in its relevance to people's day-to-day lives this
is one initiative that is bringing Europe closer to citizens' concerns.