manifestation of problems without dealing with the problems. It is, of course, generally easier to throw people in jail rather than spend the time to return them to productive society. It may well be easier but, given the high costs of imprisonment, it is probably not cheaper.

Where drugs are concerned, Bermuda needs to deal with the demand for drugs and the social conditions which cause that demand. Yet we are still spending a good deal of time and effort on the supply of drugs and on punishment rather than cure of drug abuse. Now we have a proposed disciplinary code for primary and secondary schools which suggests reporting students who use or sell drugs in the schools to the Police and also indicates that such students may well be expelled from the schools. Drug use and drug pushing are criminal offences and place the schools in a difficult position but Bermuda must consider the dire results of such action. A criminal record brands students locally but also means the double punishment of no travel to the United States and no further education in the United States. We can only draw the conclusion that if the schools expel drug abusers, many will then sit about, poorly educated, and use and sell some more drugs. That cannot be seen as socially desirable nor can it be seen as good schooling. We understand that under the code of discipline expulsion would be a last resort but we would like to be sure that it is only done after every effort at rehabilitation.

Surely the schools have to accept some responsibility for the students who become drug users and drug pushers. Drug abuse is more often than not a symptom of other problems, many of them in the home, but kicking young people out of school, knowing that a real alternative is the streets is not a sensible solution. We think schools have a responsibility to the "whole student''. That being the case, they cannot abdicate and say, "We can't cope.

Let's give them to the Police. Clearly this solution is being suggested because classroom problems make it difficult to teach and those who behave well in school are being deprived of learning by those who behave badly. Too often older Bermudians think of the classrooms as being as orderly as they were in their day. In fact, today's classroom can be very different. We recognise that the basic job of a teacher is to teach and that classrooms are for learning. But we also believe that every effort has to be made to keep students there so that they can learn.

We agree that in some serious cases action by the Police may be the only course of action left but it should be a final resort and not a usual step.

Aside from anything else, we are spending huge fortunes on a "mega school'' at Prospect designed to stop Bermudians from "falling through the cracks'', and here we are defining cracks for them to fall through.

Surely the whole concept of the "mega school'' is a recognition that there are young Bermudians who can be better served by the school system. In an ideal world every student would be well behaved and bent on learning. We have recognised that that is not the case. Why then are we planning a code of discipline that admits defeat?