Initial Remarks

All of us are in the same side of this issue in the sense that we are all trying to reduce drug use and abuse and all the crime and misery that accompany them.

The question is what is the best way to accomplish that goal? One thing we do know is that what we are presently doing is not working.

There are more addicts, more violent crime, more property crime, and increasingly invasive gang behaviour, more deaths on the roads and more guns.

It is pretty obvious that if we keep doing the same things we will continue to get the same results.

The good news is that there are a variety of things that we can do differently to change this trajectory.

This is a complex and multifaceted problem that will require intervention and participation from all levels of the community from politicians on down to the individuals living in their neighbourhoods.

Decriminalising marijuana may be one of the possibilities to consider as we move forward.

If marijuana were legalised or decriminalised, it would remove the profit motive and help put an end to the senseless violence that stems from drug battles.

Evidence of that can be found by looking back to the Prohibition Era in North America (1913-1931) which was an era marked by the same kind of bloodshed and rampant violence that the illegal drug trade has spawned.

The Tobacco Experience:

The recent experience in the attempt to reduce the use of tobacco has demonstrated the powerful effect of concentrated public education mixed with public policy prohibiting the use of tobacco in public places.

The case can be made that the approach taken regarding tobacco has been far more effective in changing behaviour than criminalisation.

In my experience on the Parole Board, in excess of 80 percent of inmates had committed drug-related crime from robbery to fund the purchase of drugs, to violence associated with selling the drugs, or simply the importation of the drugs themselves.

Most of the violent crime and almost all of the murders in Bermuda are fuelled by the drug trade most of it resulting from attempts by gangs to acquire drugs, to settle disputes among drug merchants and their customers, or steal drugs or drug money from dealers.

In addition, most, if not all of the property crime can be traced back to addicts unable to afford to feed their habit.

Furthermore, the recent rise in the prevalence and use of guns is entirely a function of drug- and gang-related activity

According to the Rand Corporation Study, drug treatment programmes are seven times more cost effective in reducing drug use than law enforcement efforts.

It also states that drug treatment is 11 times more effective than attempting to interdict the drugs coming into the country.

Young boys from single-parent families of limited means who are not receiving adequate anti-drug education often choose as role models their high-rolling neighbourhood drug dealers.

This makes it very easy to recruit young men into gangs networks, especially the multitudes who are suspended and expelled from the public school system, some as young as 13,14, and 15 years of age.

Drug sales in some of the disadvantaged neighbourhoods of Bermuda are part of a growing informal economy which has expanded and organised in response to the loss of employment opportunities that once produced income sufficient to afford housing and provide for the basic necessities.

The gap between basic wages and the cost of living that has grown exponentially over the last 25 years has fuelled not only the underground drug economy but in parallel the market for those drugs as people whose lives become increasingly difficult look to drugs to assuage the pain and frustration of losing ground.

Arguments Against– Decriminalisation

The argument is often made that legalising or decriminalising marijuana would (a) increase the number of users, (b) increase the number of addicts and (c) that this will have a springboard effect on users as they move to other more addictive and increasingly harmful drugs.

The multitude of studies published in respectable journals, coupled with numerous cross-cultural studies of countries that have either legalised or decriminalised marijuana suggests that while there are some indications of increased use (though many studies dispute this fact) the overwhelming indications are that when the cost savings and indeed the resultant profits are used for treatment, prevention, education and investment in the social safety net, the addiction rates fall, the violent crime rates fall and the property crime rates fall.

In North America drug interdiction rates run between five percent and ten percent of all drugs imported.

Most experts claim that five percent is the more accurate figure.

The National Drug Control Policies and Master Plan 2001-2007 said there were 400 seizures and 500 drug related arrests each year.

In 2006 there were 816 64 were at the airport 73 through courier services and 31 via cruise ships.

That year they totalled to 474 kilo of cannabis; 4.9 kilos of coke; 5.4 kilos of cannabis resin; 118 cannabis plants; 2.4 kilos of diamorphine and 20,373 methamphetamines pills.

While most other sectors have seen sales stagnate through this recession, illegal drugs sales (for some pretty obvious reasons) have made healthy gains.

While interdiction is an ineffective way to stem the tide, the risk it creates drives up the price which in turn drives up the profit which fuels violence associated with turf warfare.

Any move toward decriminalisation or legalisation should be done in the context of a well-planned strategy which takes free enterprise out of the picture.

All revenues should go to a strictly regulated public agency dedicated to a sustained and continuous information policy designed to inform the public of dangers associated with drug use.

This agency would also fund treatment for addicts, recognising that addiction is a medical (not moral) condition.

European countries that focus on public health and harm reduction instead of prohibition have much lower addiction rates and consequently vastly lower violent crime rates

A Gateway Drug?

The argument is often made that marijuana is a gateway drug leading to the use of more dangerous and addictive drugs.

There is considerable evidence to suggest that it is the intermittent unavailability of marijuana that leads to a marijuana user to use other products and that access and reasonable pricing would prevent, rather than encourage, that kind of escalation.

How to Reduce the Demand?

Let's stop and ask why the seemingly desperate need to escape reality what is it about the lives of such a significant portion of our community that attracts them to substances that blot out reality?

What are the kinds of families and communities that lead one to seek out this kind of escape and what are the factors in one's environment that leave some of our family so vulnerable and susceptible to drug abuse and addiction?

We know what many of these factors are there is plenty of research available drawing the connection between certain kinds of early life experiences and addiction in adulthood such as emotional deprivation as well as physical and sexual abuse.

These are coupled with a variety of predisposing biogenetic factors that lead one to be especially vulnerable to addiction.

Most of these are factors that well-funded, intelligent prevention programmes and social policy can address in the early years of the child's life to reduce the likelihood of abuse or addiction.

Such changes in approach will coincidentally affect the rates of addiction of alcohol and other legal drugs.

Addiction, while it runs the gamut of all social-economic groups, thrives particularly well in communities that perceive themselves to be marginalised, who lack opportunities, where wages are so low that long working hours are required to pay for basic necessities and where families are unable to spend quality time in supportive, nurturing relationships.

These factors are very often part of the Bermuda experience and are all factors that can be affected by realigning public policy.