RCMP'S 'E' DIVISION SHOULD STAND UP FOR ITSELF

(CNS) The RCMP has its problems but nothing justifies cowering before
special interest groups.

This time, it's "E" Division that's under fire from the Pivot Legal
Society in a Vancouver battleground where electoral politics has
nothing on the politics of supervised drug injection.

The Downtown Eastside's Insite is on the brink of becoming Canada's
worst public policy disaster, yet last week the Pivot Legal Society
called for Canada's auditor-general to investigate the RCMP's
authority to commission research into the facility's effects on crime
and associated issues.

The problem? First -- and despite the information being available on
one website more than a year ago -- Pivot alleges the research was
"secretly" commissioned. Second, though two reports were favourable
to Insite, two were critical: One by Garth Davies, a professor at
Simon Fraser University, and the other, the now seminal analysis
titled A Critique of Canada's Insite Injection Site and its Parent Philosophy.

Written by Dr. Colin Mangham, a veteran of nearly 30 years in
substance abuse prevention and a former professor of health education
at Dalhousie University, the critique painstakingly questions studies
suggesting Insite variously saves lives, reduces crime and disease
transmission, or encourages treatment.

It also exposes the facility's parent philosophy that drugs are a
lifestyle choice, a premise whose ethical contradictions can only be
resolved by legalizing drugs or, as the city of Oslo recently
determined, by closing its injection facility.

Mangham has confirmed to me that nothing in his paper has been
disproved or even specifically challenged. Instead, and given its
status as the new four-letter word, it is being dismissed as
"ideologically" biased (though, as someone once observed,
name-calling is the last refuge of the intellectually bankrupt.)

It's not the first time. Like Davies and Mangham, Health Canada's
panel of experts summarized first the studies' positive findings then
their methodological and design flaws.

Among many qualifications to the studies' assertions, the panel noted
how only five per cent of drug addicts in the area were using the
facility, and of those, only 20 per cent on a regular basis.

Its report was promptly dismissed as "political."

And when addiction treatment specialist Dr. Donald Hedges attempted
to appear before a parliamentary committee to argue Insite is
encouraging risky behaviour (the heroin addict needs progressively
higher highs), he was harassed and intimidated by demonstrators.

Thug democracy rules and now it's the RCMP. Never mind the quality of
the work, just question the right of a beleaguered institution to undertake it.

To make matters really interesting, point to derogatory remarks
coined by a retired constable about the B.C. Centre for Excellence in
HIV/Aids which nonetheless powerfully symbolize the deep chasm
between the epidemiologists who dominate Insite scholarship and
officers who must work in an area which after five years of Insite
remains an open-air lavatory. Literally.

Let's be clear. All experts, however narrow their disciplines, have
important contributions to make. Those with experience in the field
are no less important than those in academe.

But there is good reason why neither should dictate public policy
which must save lives, reconcile competing interests and address
complex issues. Only the citizenry through its elected
representatives can do this.

Still, if the Pivot Legal Society wishes to involve the
auditor-general, so be it. Transparency is always a good thing.

While she's at it, why not open the books of all the service
organizations in the Downtown Eastside. Why not reveal the names of
board members, peer reviewers, their fees and salaries, spousal
relationships, political connections and who, in what government
department, motivated by what rationale, is authorizing payment for all this.

Better still, why not just concentrate on ending drug use and addiction?

As the RCMP begins its internal review into this matter, let "E"
Division stand tall for its own area of expertise. Since access to
drugs is the biggest challenge to recovery from addiction, no
treatment or prevention agenda is possible without a law and order agenda.

Sweden's zero-tolerance model and mandatory treatment for addicted
repeat offenders should also be considered.