Calls for reform grow

This month we have seen a plethora or articles in UK newspapers calling for an end to prohibition. There have been so many we thought we’d bring you the best of them in one blog.

The articles are written by a variety of people including a former chief constable, a well-known British philosopher and the former President of Brazil not to mention a number of journalists.

This increase in the number of articles in the British press reflects a change that is going on globally. As a number of Latin American countries move towards decriminalisation, it is sad that the UK government is so far behind in its thinking.

First up was Simon Jenkins in the Guardian who argued that the War on Drugs was ‘moral idiocy’ and praised the Latin American governments for their courage in admitting that current policy has failed.

He said,

‘The underlying concept of the war on drugs, initiated by Richard Nixon in the 1970s, is that demand can be curbed by eliminating supply. It has been enunciated by every US president and every British prime minister. Tony Blair thought that by occupying Afghanistan he could rid the streets of Britain of heroin. He told Clare Short to do it. Gordon Brown believes it to this day.

This concept marries intellectual idiocy – that supply leads demand – with practical impossibility. But it is golden politics. For 30 years it has allowed western politicians to shift blame for not regulating drug abuse at home on to the shoulders of poor countries abroad. It is gloriously, crashingly immoral.’

Days later in The Observer, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, former President of Brazil, summarised the report he and the former presidents of Colombia and Mexico co-authored.

‘It is time to admit the obvious. The "war on drugs" has failed, at least in the way it has been waged so far. In Latin America, the "unintended" consequences have been disastrous. Thousands of people have lost their lives in drug-associated violence. Drug lords have taken over entire communities. Misery has spread. Corruption is undermining fragile democracies…

‘The core conclusion of the statement is that a paradigm shift is required away from repression of drug users and towards treatment and prevention. The challenge is to reduce drastically the harm caused by illegal narcotics to people, societies and public institutions.’

British philosopher John Gray got in on the act in The Guardian a few days later arguing that ‘the case for legalising all drugs is unanswerable.’

He wrote,

‘A decade or so ago, it could be argued that the evidence was not yet in on drugs. No one has ever believed illegal drug use could be eliminated, but there was a defensible view that prohibition could prevent more harm than it caused. Drug use is not a private act without consequences for others; even when legal, it incurs medical and other costs to society. A society that adopted an attitude of laissez-faire towards the drug habits of its citizens could find itself with higher numbers of users. There could be a risk of social abandonment, with those in poor communities being left to their fates.

‘These dangers have not disappeared, but the fact is that the costs of drug prohibition now far outweigh any possible benefits the policy may bring. It is time for a radical shift in policy. Full-scale legalisation, with the state intervening chiefly to regulate quality and provide education on the risks of drug use and care for those who have problems with the drugs they use, should now shape the agenda of drug law reform.’

Just days later, the Executive Director of the UNODC wrote an article in the Observer disputing these arguments. He initially focussed on the claim made by John Gray and many others including Transform, that the costs of prohibition outweigh the benefits.

Costa wrote,

‘Some even say that the costs of prohibition far outweigh the benefits (although there is no body count of people who haven't died thanks to drug control versus those who have been killed in the crossfire).’

He then went on to argue that,

‘Maybe western governments could absorb the health costs of increased drug use [that he assumes would occur once drugs were legalized], if that's how taxpayers want their money to be spent.

‘But what about the developing world? Why unleash an epidemic of addiction in parts of the world that already face misery, and do not have the health and social systems to cope with a drug tsunami?

‘Critics point out that vulnerable countries are the hardest hit by the crime associated with drug trafficking. Fair enough. But these countries would also be the hardest hit by an epidemic of drug use, and all the health and social costs that come with it. This is immoral and irresponsible.’

A few months ago we had a comment posted on the Transform blog refuting this argument.

‘Was it just me or did someone else pick up the massive contradiction underlying the WDR's main argument for continued prohibition? In section 2.1 of the report, the UNODC crowd pretty much concedes that a legalize-tax-and-regulate framework would work...but only in developed countries. Developing countries are thought unable to impose meaningful taxes and regulations on a legal drug industry, and therefore, would see their consumption levels explode. Thus, global prohibition must continue for the sake of poor countries (the condescension is almost unbearable).

‘Yet those same developing countries are expected to, simultaneously,: a) successfully interdict supply; b) reform police forces and judicial systems; c) fight corruption in the face of massive illegal profits; d) address the problem of slums and dereliction in cities; e) close open drug-markets; f) provide universal access to drug treatment; etc. etc. If the governments of developing countries are considered too weak to tax and regulate small national drug markets, why would anyone think them capable of performing that daunting list of tasks? The contradiction is so glaring that my eyes hurt.’

On the same day, and in the same newspaper, that Costa, wrote his piece, Tom Lloyd, a former chief constable, argued that the War on Drugs was a ‘not only very expensive and misdirected activity, but counterproductive and harmful’.

‘More recently, I have been working abroad and the problems that exist worldwide are recognised at the highest levels, with most acknowledging the harmful unintended consequences [including Costa himself] of the current approach. A huge criminal market (with enormous financial incentives) has been created using corruption and violence to make its huge profits.

‘Efforts to destroy crops only destroy peasant farmers' livelihoods and the environment, while the poppy fields and coca plants spring up elsewhere, with producers adapting to meet the demand. Growing other crops is futile if the demand for drugs remains.

‘Our limited resources are directed towards this futile "war" while public health, which is clearly the first principle of drug control, remains an impoverished baby brother.’

He went on to call on

‘police leaders throughout the world to challenge the status quo and focus resources on serious, organised criminals, not blighted users, and to focus on harm reduction not some pie-in-the-sky dream of a drug-free society. Where they lead, politicians will follow.’

In the same edition of The Observer there was a leader article calling for ‘a new drugs policy’ and arguing for an honest evaluation of the current drugs laws.

‘The entire framework of the debate must change. In Britain, we operate with laws that start from the premise that drug use is inherently morally wrong, and then seek ways to stop it. Instead we must start by evaluating the harm that drug use does, and then look for the best ways to alleviate it; and we must have the courage to follow that logic wherever it leads.’

This has been Transform’s position from the start. Now is the time to assess the impacts of the current policy and look to a future where drug use is not a moral issue but a public health issue where drugs are controlled and regulated by governments not gangsters.

Heroin trials welcome - but the wait has cost lives

Transform yesterday wholeheartedly welcomed the results of the heroin prescribing trials (as reported by the BBC), and the understanding that these pilots would be rolled out further still – perhaps to four or five new locations.

However, as the RIOTT Trials are published to much celebration, what have we really discovered?

That problematic heroin users do better on legally regulated pharmaceutically pure diamorphine, than street junk - they steal less and their health improves

That should not be news to anyone. I realised during my third or fourth interview yesterday, that the feigned shock from radio presenters that the Great British Public would be funding heroin users ‘addiction’, should be as nothing compared to their real shock that we are all funding the prohibition that leads users to steal and compromises their health in the first place.

Whilst the presumed roll out is to be welcomed, one has to ask why it has taken so long to come to this conclusion. Evidence has existed for years that, for those assessed as having a clinical need, heroin prescribing will keep them alive, improve their health and wellbeing and reduce the collateral damage of their use to wider society. Indeed there has been a barely concealed sense of inevitability about these trials; the strong impression being that they were needed to provide political cover for a roll out, rather than to provide yet more evidence of the blatantly obvious.

Of course supervised use of legally regulated supplies of heroin significantly improve the lives of users, who otherwise have commit crime to raise money to score dirty drugs from gangsters, for consumption using dirty paraphernalia in marginalised and unsafe environments. The lesson here is that moves to take users out of the illegal market and into a regulated supply where drugs are quality controlled will produce the kind of outcomes we all want to see.

The fact is that thousands of long term dependent heroin users have died, or contracted serious diseases in the last three decades because of the failure of Government to maintain or develop heroin prescribing services. And, with the Department of Health playing badly strung second fiddle to the Home Office, much of the medical establishment has been complicit in this tragedy by maintaining a deafening silence.

But NHS heroin isn't the only way forward here; access to cheap smokeable opium from licenced outlets would also achieve significant decreases in crime and improvements in health, as it would also promote transition towards safer products, using behaviours, and using environments. We would hope too, that the next round of trials includes provision of oral morphine (and possibly other pill form synthetic and semi-synthetic opiates), which will be effective for many, and is also dramatically cheaper, and safer, than injectable dry ampules.

The substantially increased cost of prescribing injectable heroin, compared with oral methadone, must also be seen in the context of the Macfarlane Smith monopoly on the UK opiates market that the Department of Health buys from. That means that the UK pays well over the odds for our diamorphine (£12,000 a year per user), compared to the Dutch (£2000 a year for the same product). This artificial cost barrier has been a major political obstacle.

Finally, let us hope that these trials pave the way to more discussion of how best to control and regulate drug supply and use, beyond the limited numbers able to avail themselves of medicalised heroin. And that those members of the medical establishment who have held this initiative back, feel their consciences pricked and support a scheme that could save the lives of hundreds more in the future.

New Scientist: 'Blueprint for a Better World: Legalise drugs'

This weeks' edition of New Scientist magazine has a cover feature titled 'Blueprint for a better world' that considers 10 'radical ideas for transforming society and changing the way countries are run'. One of them is the legalisation and regulation of drugs, copied below. Whilst we didn't initiate or suggest the piece, we have contributed.



The ten ideas are introduced thus:

We live in an imperfect world. Poverty, disease, lack of education, environmental destruction - the problems are all too obvious. Many people don't have clean water, let alone enough food, and the unsustainable lifestyle of the wealthy few is storing up catastrophic climate change. Can we do anything about it? You bet we can. Technology is a double-edged sword, but science and reason have made our lives immeasurably better overall - and only through science and reason can we hope to make a real difference in the future. So here and over the next three weeks, New Scientist will explore diverse ideas for making the world a better place, and the evidence backing them.

Better world: Legalise drugs

• 09 September 2009 by Clare Wilson

Far from protecting us and our children, the war on drugs is making the world a much more dangerous place.

SO FAR this year, about 4000 people have died in Mexico's drugs war - a horrifying toll. If only a good fairy could wave a magic wand and make all illegal drugs disappear, the world would be a better place.

Dream on. Recreational drug use is as old as humanity, and has not been stopped by the most draconian laws. Given that drugs are here to stay, how do we limit the harm they do?

The evidence suggests most of the problems stem not from drugs themselves, but from the fact that they are illegal. The obvious answer, then, is to make them legal.

The argument most often deployed in support of the status quo is that keeping drugs illegal curbs drug use among the law-abiding majority, thereby reducing harm overall. But a closer look reveals that this really doesn't stand up. In the UK, as in many countries, the real clampdown on drugs started in the late 1960s, yet government statistics show that the number of heroin or cocaine addicts seen by the health service has grown ever since - from around 1000 people per year then, to 100,000 today. It is a pattern that has been repeated the world over.

A second approach to the question is to look at whether fewer people use drugs in countries with stricter drug laws. In 2008, the World Health Organization looked at 17 countries and found no such correlation. The US, despite its punitive drug policies, has one of the highest levels of drug use in the world (PLoS Medicine, vol 5, p e141).

A third strand of evidence comes from what happens when a country softens its drug laws, as Portugal did in 2001. While dealing remains illegal in Portugal, personal use of all drugs has been decriminalised. The result? Drug use has stayed roughly constant, but ill health and deaths from drug taking have fallen. "Judged by virtually every metric, the Portuguese decriminalisation framework has been a resounding success," states a recent report by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank based in Washington DC.

By any measure, making drugs illegal fails to achieve one of its primary objectives. But it is the unintended consequences of prohibition that make the most compelling case against it. Prohibition fuels crime in many ways: without state aid, addicts may be forced to fund their habit through robbery, for instance, while youngsters can be drawn into the drugs trade as a way to earn money and status. In countries such as Colombia and Mexico, the profits from illegal drugs have spawned armed criminal organisations whose resources rival those of the state. Murder, kidnapping and corruption are rife.

Making drugs illegal also makes them more dangerous. The lack of access to clean needles for drug users who inject is a major factor in the spread of lethal viruses such as HIV and hepatitis C.

So what's the alternative? There are several models for the legal provision of recreational drugs. They include prescription by doctors, consumption at licensed premises or even sale on a similar basis to alcohol and tobacco, with health warnings and age limits. If this prospect appals you, consider the fact that in the US today, many teenagers say they find it easier to buy cannabis than beer.

Taking any drug - including alcohol and nicotine - does have health risks, but a legal market would at least ensure that the substances people ingest or inject are available unadulterated and at known dosages. Much of the estimated $300 billion earned from illegal drugs worldwide, which now funds crime, corruption and environmental destruction, could support legitimate jobs. And instead of spending tens of billions enforcing prohibition, governments would gain income from taxes that could be spent on medical treatment for the small proportion of users who become addicted or whose health is otherwise harmed.

Unfortunately, the idea that banning drugs is the best way to protect vulnerable people - especially children - has acquired a strong emotional grip, one that politicians are happy to exploit. For many decades, laws and public policy have flown in the face of the evidence. Far from protecting us, this approach has made the world a much more dangerous place than it need be.

Book of the month: the Candy Machine

We'd like to recommend The Candy Machine: How Cocaine Took Over the World by Tom Feiling as our book of the month.



Here's a review by Transform volunteer David Hart below:

The author of this book makes plain in his introduction that he was less interested in the opinions of experts and celebrities than he was in hearing the viewpoint of the ordinary people involved in the cocaine trade, from peasant coca farmers through to urban crack smokers, in the interests of presenting as authentic a picture as possible of the impact of cocaine on society.

The book is divided into three sections. The first charts the history of the cocaine trade from the conquistadors to the present, as well as the increasing levels of repression the US government has employed against it.

The second analyses the cocaine trade's impact on those countries that produce it or through which it is trafficked, focussing on Jamaica, Mexico, and of course Colombia, asking why that country is the only one in the world to be a producer of cocaine, cannabis and heroin (apparently a combination of proximity to trade routes, a long tradition of lawlessness, economic inequality and chronic underinvestment in the rural economy). In all cases Feiling attempts to show how the economic circumstances of these producer/transit countries makes the cocaine trade so powerful that law enforcement efforts are doomed never to be able to do more than inconvenience it, let alone eradicate it. Indeed, the level to which Colombia's government, police and judiciary are complicit with the cocaine traffickers is truly spectacular.

A salutary warning of the likely consequences of continuation of current policies is the incipient transformation into narco-states that afflicts those countries in West Africa which have become transit hubs for cocaine entering Europe; Feiling notes that the cocaine trade offers prospects for economic development that international neo-liberal financial policies have failed to provide for these states with weak government and scant resources, and is therefore unlikely to be effectively opposed by the local population.

The third section concerns prospects for the future. There is detailed analysis of the demand for cocaine and why it is so persistent, as well as the health consequences for different forms of the drug, which concludes that problematic use, especially of crack, is usually a symptom of underlying emotional problems, sometimes but not exclusively associated with poverty and deprivation, noting that the 'career' of the average cocaine user is far shorter than that of typical heroin or alcohol users.

In the chapter analysing the arguments for legalisation and where they are coming from, we hear from Jack Cole of the group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, and Sir Keith Morris [now a Transform supporter], whose experience as the UK's ambassador to Colombia has led him to come out against the war on drugs - both indicative of the fact that even those charged with defending prohibition can draw their own conclusions when exposed to the consequences.

Discussion of cocaine rarely makes much mention of coca leaf tea/chewing, but here we are told of the Colombian coca-leaf drink producers who had to fight a lawsuit to be allowed to use the word 'coca' in the name of their product, and of the WHO report (it was suppressed by the USA who threatened to withdraw funding) that found that chewing coca leaves had negligible health risks.

The book concludes that, while those in charge of drug policy are 'unwilling to admit their addiction to...the illusion of control', change is unlikely to come from above unless prohibition becomes financially unviable, but in the US there is already widespread change underway at state or city level, and that whatever drug policy is in place, the problems of compulsive use will not go away until 'nations produce responsible citizens with stakes in conventional society'.

That is not in itself a comforting thought, but hopefully this book will help spread the reform message a little further; certainly it's a well researched and informative work for those interested in the subject.

• The Candy Machine has also been reviewed by The Guardian and The Telegraph
  
  
• The Home Affairs Select Committee is looking into the cocaine trade at present. Transform has sent in a submission and is expected to be called to give evidence later this year.
  
  
• Transform is pleased to announce the launch of our Amazon Associate bookstore. We’ve now assembled a list of some of the best books available about drug policy and drug law reform, which can be found here.
  
  
• All books listed have a link to www.amazon.com where the book is available to purchase.
  
  
• Buy books through our site and you’ll even be helping Transform make some money as we receive a 10% donation of the cost of the book at no extra cost to you.
  
  
• Please send an email to info@tdpf.org.uk to recommend books, or if you’d like to review any of the books listed.

Please spread the word and happy reading.

Argentine Supreme Court to decriminalise drug possession today

So, in the same month that the UK Government is making political capital from attaching long prison sentences to several new drugs few people have even heard of, in a seemingly parallel universe not populated by drug warriors, other countries are queuing up to decriminalise personal possession of all drugs. Last week Mexico joined the growing list and today the Argentine Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling decriminalising drug possession for personal use.

The Court’s decision was based on a case brought by a 19 year-old who was arrested in the street for possession of two grams of cannabis. He was convicted and sentenced to a month and a half in prison, but challenged the constitutionality of the drug law based on Article 19 of the Argentine Constitution:

The private actions of men which in no way offend public order or morality, nor injure a third party, are only reserved to God and are exempted from the authority of judges. No inhabitant of the Nation shall be obliged to perform what the law does not demand nor deprived of what it does not prohibit.

Today, the Supreme Court ruled that personal drug consumption is covered by that privacy clause stipulated in Article 19 of the Constitution since it doesn’t affect third parties. Questions still remain, though, on the extent of the ruling. However, the government of President Cristina Fernández has fully endorsed the Court’s decision and has vowed to promptly submit a bill to Congress that would define the details of the decriminalization policies.

According to some reports, Brazil and Ecuador are considering similar steps.

The case has been under consideration by the high court for almost a year. The Argentine federal government has been reviewing its drug laws with an eye toward abandoning repressive policies toward users and is waiting for this case to be decided to move forward with new legislative proposals.

Supreme Court Justice Carlos Fayt told the Buenos Aires Herald that the court had reached a unanimous position on decriminalization, but declined to provide further details.

A positive Supreme Court decision on decriminalization would ratify a number of lower court decisions in recent years that have found that the use and possession of drugs without causing harm to others should not be a criminal offense.

see previous Transform blog coverage:

• Drug decriminlisation in Argentina? (April 08)
  

• Argentine president calls for decriminalisation of drug use (Aug 08)
  

related coverage:

• Mexico decriminalises personal drug possession

• Former Latin American presidents call for a paradigm shift

• Honduran president calls for legalisation of drugs

• Mexico's opposition calls for legalisation of drugs

further reading:

Drug policy reform in practice - useful new briefing from TNI on decriminlisation and other forms of reform in Europe and the America's

thanks to Stop the Drug War and Cato@Liberty

Mexico decriminalises personal drug possession

On Thursday Mexico finally enacted legislation to decriminalize personal possession of small quantities of all drugs (plans reported/discussed in more detail here back in May).

The legislation will operate in a somewhat similar fashion to the Portugese approach with arrested individuals having to agree to a drug treatment program to address admitted addiction or enter a prevention program designed for recreational users. penalties for those who refuse to attend one of these kinds of programs under the Mexican scheme have yet to be clarified.

The Mexican legislation defines threshold quantities of drugs under which which a designation of personal use can be made. These include 5 g of cannabis, or half 0.5g of cocaine, 50mg of heroin, LSD 0.015mg, and MDA/MDMA/methamphetamine all at 40mg (or 200mg for pills). Problems with such thresholds to make a distinction between possession for personal use and intent to supply offences have recently been discussed in a the context of UK legislation ( see appendix of this Transform briefing).

The response from the US has so far been somewhat muted, in stark contrast to the uproar that greeted similar proposals from the previous President Vincent Fox in 2006 , which were abandoned under extreme pressure from the Bush administration.

In many respects the legislation represents a formalisation of what was widespread tolerant policing practice - so may not have a huge impact on the ground.

Mexico joins a growing list of countries around the world that have either made similar moves or have them in the pipeline (see further reading below). Such moves - it is important to note - only address personal possession and use and do not involve decriminalisation or legalisation/regulation of drug production and supply which remains in the control of criminal enterprises. The UN treaties, whilst theoretically allowing moves towards decriminalising (or at least depenalising) personal use, specifically outlaw exploring options for legal regulation of production/supply. That said - there is an increasingly active debate in Latin America around such moves (see below).

For more details see this Associated Press report 20.08.09

Further reading

• Drug policy reform in practice - useful new briefing from TNI on decriminlisation and other forms of reform in Europe and the America's

• Former Latin American presidents call for a paradigm shift

• Argentine president calls for decriminalisation of drug use

• Honduran president calls for legalisation of drugs

• Mexico's opposition calls for legalisation of drugs
  

Baltimore police call for an end to the drug war

This is a short clip from MSNBC news, featuring interviews with the authors of a recent Washington Post article 'It's time to legalise drugs'; Peter Moskos, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the author of "Cop in the Hood", and Neill Franklin, a 32-year law enforcement veteran. Both served as Baltimore City police officers (home of 'The Wire') and are members of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.




from the Washington Post piece:

"Only after years of witnessing the ineffectiveness of drug policies -- and the disproportionate impact the drug war has on young black men -- have we and other police officers begun to question the system.

Cities and states license beer and tobacco sellers to control where, when and to whom drugs are sold. Ending Prohibition saved lives because it took gangsters out of the game. Regulated alcohol doesn't work perfectly, but it works well enough. Prescription drugs are regulated, and while there is a huge problem with abuse, at least a system of distribution involving doctors and pharmacists works without violence and high-volume incarceration. Regulating drugs would work similarly: not a cure-all, but a vast improvement on the status quo.

Legalization would not create a drug free-for-all. In fact, regulation reins in the mess we already have. If prohibition decreased drug use and drug arrests acted as a deterrent, America would not lead the world in illegal drug use and incarceration for drug crimes.

Drug manufacturing and distribution is too dangerous to remain in the hands of unregulated criminals. Drug distribution needs to be the combined responsibility of doctors, the government, and a legal and regulated free market. This simple step would quickly eliminate the greatest threat of violence: street-corner drug dealing.

We simply urge the federal government to retreat. Let cities and states (and, while we're at it, other countries) decide their own drug policies. Many would continue prohibition, but some would try something new. California and its medical marijuana dispensaries provide a good working example, warts and all, that legalized drug distribution does not cause the sky to fall.

Having fought the war on drugs, we know that ending the drug war is the right thing to do -- for all of us, especially taxpayers. While the financial benefits of drug legalization are not our main concern, they are substantial. In a July referendum, Oakland, Calif., voted to tax drug sales by a 4-to-1 margin. Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron estimates that ending the drug war would save $44 billion annually, with taxes bringing in an additional $33 billion.

Without the drug war, America's most decimated neighborhoods would have a chance to recover. Working people could sit on stoops, misguided youths wouldn't look up to criminals as role models, our overflowing prisons could hold real criminals, and -- most important to us -- more police officers wouldn't have to die."

A visual taxonomy of psychoactive drugs

This useful visual taxonomy of psychoactive drugs is from the brilliant Information is Beautiful blog (July 09). Click to see full resolution.

FT weekend magazine cover story: "Legalise the Lot"

We mentioned this excellent recent article by Mathew Engel in the Financial Times in the miniblog but I thought it was worth posting a scan* of the FT weekend magazine cover.




That this article appeared in the FT is significant given its readership and prestige within the media, and the fact that it made the magazine cover so prominently is testimony to how mainstream the reform arguments have become.



* sorry the scan is a bit rubbish - my only copy got a bit crumpled

Transform on Twitter

We have finally given in to the inevitable and set up shop on Twitter. You can find our twitter page here .



On top of any other pertinent 140 character drug policy musings we may have, the Transform blog and miniblog posts both automaticallyfeed directly into our Twitter. We will also be building up a collection of other interesting twitter activity to follow - so please post links below.

The US Government will to pay you to grow cannabis and roll joints for them.

The following announcement appeared on the US Government's Federal Business Opportunities website today:

Production, Analysis, & Distribution of Cannabis & Marijuana Cigarettes

Solicitation Number: N01DA-10-7773
Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Office: National Institutes of Health
Location: National Institute on Drug Abuse


Synopsis:
Added: Aug 05, 2009 9:03 am
The National Institute on Drug Abuse is soliciting proposals from qualified organizations having the capability to (1) grow, harvest, analyze, store and distribute GMP grade cannabis (marijuana) on large and small scales; (2) extract cannabis to obtain purified phytocannabinoids including delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (delta-9-THC), analyze, and store; (3) prepare marijuana cigarettes and related products; and (4) distribute marijuana, marijuana cigarettes and cannabinoids, and other related products for research and other Government programs upon NIDA authorization. Offeror must possess suitable and secure DEA approved outdoor and indoor growing facilities, research laboratory with appropriate analytical instruments, and experienced personnel to conduct the project tasks. Appropriate DEA approved secure facility for manufacturing of marijuana cigarettes, and their storage, and DEA Schedule I registration for marijuana and THC are essential. NIDA anticipates a 1-year with four 1 year options cost reimbursement type contract will be awarded. Additional quantity options for manufacturing cigarettes may also be required. In order to handle substances under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, it is mandatory that offerors possess a DEA Research Registration for Schedules II to V and demonstrate the capability to obtain a DEA registration for Schedule I controlled substances. All studies must be carried out under pertinent FDA regulations, such as current Good Clinical Practice (cGCP) and current Good Laboratory Practice (cGLP) regulations. The pertinent FDA's guidelines/guidance shall be followed. RFP No. N01DA-10-7773 will be available electronically on or about August 25, 2009. You can access the RFP through the FedBizOpps http://fbo.gov or through the NIDA website at the following address: http://www.nida.nih.gov/RFP/RFPList.html. The electronic RFP contains all information needed to submit a proposal. No printed version of the solicitation document or source list is available. NIDA will consider proposals submitted by any responsible offeror. Proposals will be due on or about October 9, 2009. This advertisement does not commit the Government to award a contract. Based upon market research, the Government is not using the policies contained in Part 12, Acquisition of Commercial Items, in its solicitation for the described supplies or services. However, interested persons may identify to the contracting officer their interest and capability to satisfy the Government's requirement with a commercial item within 15 days of this notice.

Contracting Office Address:
6101 Executive Boulevard
Room 260 - MSC 8402
Bethesda, Maryland 20892
Primary Point of Contact.:
Amy Sheib
ap370t@nih.gov

UKDPC calls for Tactical Strikes in the War on Drugs

In its report "Refocusing Drug-Related Law Enforcement to Address Harms" released today, the UKDPC suggests that we need to get smarter in focusing law enforcement to reduce the harms associated with illegal drugs and illegal drug markets.

In a report supported by both SOCA and ACPO, the main conclusions are:

• Enforcement has contained illegal drug supply, but more arrests and drug seizures do not always lead to lower availability or fewer problems.
• However, some innovative approaches have addressed the most harmful characteristics of entrenched drug markets e.g. violence/intimidation.
• New measures of impact are needed so operations are judged on real benefits to communities, not simply arrests and seizures.

The report suggests very clearly that there are ‘unintended consequences’ of enforcing the drug laws and quotes UNODC chief Antonia Maria Costa from his 2008 paper ‘Fit for Purpose’.

Transform welcomes the report for its clarity in showing that enforcement creates harm and for clearly calling for impact assessments of enforcement activity. As we explained in our recent meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, to be meaningful such an assessment must explore all the options.

However, it is Transform’s view that the UK’s domestic strategy on drugs is part of a global ‘war on drugs’, (despite the US Drug Czar and Roger Howard’s claims to the contrary). On the BBC news this morning Roger was at pains to explain that there is no ‘war on drugs’.

Here's the Drug Czar's quote:

"Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs' or a 'war on a product,' people see a war on them," he said; "We're not at war with people in this country."

Here's Roger's (BBC News): "You can't have a war against your own people and against your own citizens."

The fact is that states can (and do) indeed engage in drug wars against their own and other nations’ citizens. And therein lies the problem with the UKDPC report. Like the conclusion of the report from Costa, it effectively calls for ‘tactical strikes’ in the war on drugs, not an end to the war.

The ‘harms’ in the global drug war are the deaths and degradation of millions of the most marginalised people on earth, and it smacks of propaganda to even use the term ‘harms’. Tactical strikes to reduce damage to civilian bystanders is a nonsense when it is the drug control system itself and the enforcement of supply side laws that creates most of the trouble in the first place.

If we are to truly remove the ‘harms’ caused by the drug control system we do not need smarter weapons, we must end the war on drugs altogether, and replace it with a normative regime based upon human development, human security and human rights – the three pillars of the UN.

See also: Politics.co.uk on the UKDPC Report - with Transform quote

UKDPC Briefing Paper - Moving towards Real Impact Drug Enforcement

Narco Wars: Can the war be won? Video discussions

Last week Danny Kushlick, Mike Trace and David Raynes spoke at the Frontline Club to explore whether the war on drugs can be won.

You can watch the video here (sorry, the embed code doesn't seem to be working) Well worth a look to see the range of views

Danny also debated drug policy at the Cambridge Union in April this year, with Kathy Gyngell and Professor Neil MacKeganey.



Worth a look, to see Kathy and Neil try to defend the indefensible.

Home Office designates drug posession as 'victimless' crime

It is interesting that the Home Office Statistical Bulletin 'Crime in England and Wales
2008/09, Volume 1: Findings from the British Crime Survey and police recorded crime' published this week, notes (p.33):

"The BCS excludes.... those crimes termed as victimless (e.g. possession of drugs)"

'Victimless' is an interesting phrase, not one used in jurisprudence, that is essentially political - tending to be flagged up as part of moves towards criminal penalties being removed (it rather reminded me of the old 'no victim, no crime' cannabis campaign stickers). Its inclusion here perhaps reflects the wider trend towards acknowledging personal drug use is not rightly the subject of criminal sanction even if it is the subject of social or state disapproval in one form or other. This is more than a purely intellectual trend as actual or de-facto decriminalisation of personal possession and use of drugs taking place in much of Europe and around the world.

Where this leads intellectually is also an interesting question; if possession and consenting adult use is not criminal, what are the implications for commercial drug transactions between consenting adults, that also have no obvious victim? The statistical crime bulletin could very soon be largely just blank pages.

Transform submission to Consultation on Sentencing For Drug Offences

Last week we submitted our response to the Sentencing Advisory Panel's Consultation on Sentencing For Drug Offences. It asks some fundamental questions about the premises on which the recommendations for change are based. Read the full Transform submission here.

For useful companion documents see the detailed legal dissection and discussions, see Release's submission here and the UKDPC submission here.

Walter Cronkite, 1916-2009 'The Drug Dilema; War or Peace'

Walter Cronkite 'the most trusted man in America' 1916 -2009

Copied below is the epilogue by veteran newscaster Walter Cronkite, who died last week, at the close of "The Drug Dilemma: War or Peace," The Cronkite Report, June 20, 1995:

Every American was shocked when Robert McNamara, one of the master architects of the Vietnam war, acknowledged that not only did he believe the war was, "wrong, terribly wrong," but that he thought so at the very time he was helping to wage it. That's a mistake we must not make in this 10th year of America's all-out War on Drugs.

It's surely time for this nation to stop flying blind, stop accepting the assurances of politicians and other officials, that if we only keep doing what we are doing, add a little more cash, break down a few more doors, lock up a few more Jan Warrens and Nicole Richardsons, then we will see the light at the end of the tunnel. Victory will be ours.

Tonight we have seen a war that in its broad outline is not working. And we've seen some less war-like ideas that appear to hold promise. We've raised more questions than we've answered, because that's where the Drug War stands today. We're a confused people, desperately in need of answers and leadership. Legalization seems to many like too dangerous an experiment; to others, the War on Drugs, as it is now conducted, seems inhumane and too costly. Is there a middle ground?

Well, it seems to this reporter that the time has come for President Clinton to do what President Hoover did when prohibition was tearing the nation apart: appoint a bi-partisan commission of distinguished citizens, perhaps including some of the people we heard tonight, a blue-ribbon panel to re-appraise our drug policy right down to its very core, a commission with full investigative authority and the prestige and power to override bureaucratic concerns and political considerations.

Such a commission could help us focus our thinking, escape the cliches of the Drug War in favor of scientific fact, and more rationally analyze the real scope of the problem, answer the questions that bedevil us, and present a comprehensive drug policy for the future.

We cannot go into tomorrow with the same formulas that are failing today. We must not blindly add to the body count and the terrible cost of the War on Drugs, only to learn from another Robert McNamara 30 years from now that what we've been doing is, "wrong, terribly wrong."

Goodnight.

See Also:

Ethan Nadlemann on Alternet: Walter Cronkite Knew a Failed War When He Saw One: Vietnam and the War on Drugs

PM hears case for Impact Assessment of drug laws

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has held an important meeting with drugs policy campaigning group Transform, and Lembit Öpik, Liberal Democrat MP for Montgomeryshire to hear the case for an impact assessment of drug laws.

Danny Kushlick, Head of Policy and Communications at Transform Drug Policy Foundation said after the meeting:

"Impact assessment is a standard tool in Government for scrutinising policy and exploring alternative options that could achieve better outcomes. Our drug laws have not been assessed effectively since their enactment nearly forty years ago and the world is a very different place now."

"I am confident that over the coming months and years, the drug laws will receive the level of parliamentary scrutiny currently reserved for the introduction of new legislation. Impact assessment offers us all a major opportunity to reframe the drug policy debate in a less emotive and more productive manner."

"We are extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for considering our request. Mr. Brown was interested to hear about the 2003 No.10 Strategy Unit Report which he had not seen, which shows that supply side enforcement cannot work in the long term, and actually creates huge collateral damage."

Commenting after the meeting, Lembit Öpik said:

"While the Prime Minister didn't commit to implementing our request there and then, I am satisfied that he truly did listen. The impact assessment won't happen tomorrow, but this meeting is a start of a serious dialogue. We don't want to bully anyone into going along with this research - nor could we! But I'm confident that in the months ahead we will persuade the government that this is in everyone's interests, and I'm extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for holding this meeting to hear our case."

Lembit Öpik added: "Overall, the Prime Minister had a useful discussion with the delegation. No commitment has at this stage been made, but he clearly takes seriously any proposals which have the potential to help us address the misuse of drugs, and all the associated social and health costs which go with it."

Professor Richard Wilkinson, co-author of “The Spirit Level”, said;

"I support the Transform Drug Policy Foundation initiative and urge the government to undertake an impact assessment of the Misuse of Drugs Act."

ENDS

Notes to editors

1. An analysis of the 2003 No10 Strategy Unit Report can be read here

2. Richard Wilkinson is Emeritus Professor of Social Epidemiology at Nottingham University, author of 'Unequal societies; the afflictions of inequality', and co-author, with Kate Pickett, of ‘The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better’

3. Government guidelines on Impact Assessments are available here


Here is the briefing note that Transform gave to Mr Brown:

Towards Effective Drug Policy: Time for an Impact Assessment

Transform Drug Policy Foundation
Transform is a think-tank that campaigns for sustainable well being, promoting the replacement of prohibition with effective and humane systems to regulate drugs.

Recommendation
The UK Government should lead the world by carrying out an Impact Assessment (IA) of domestic drugs prohibition, starting with the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and related legislation. An IA should model all the alternatives including stepping up prohibition, Portuguese-style decriminalisation, and legal regulation. The EC and UN should undertake a similar exercise internationally to incorporate impacts on producer and transit countries, and ensure drug policy no longer undermines human development, human security and human rights.

Basis for recommendation

• Despite the billions spent each year, evidence from around the globe, (including the PM’s Strategy Unit Drugs Report of 2003 ) shows the prohibitionist approach to drugs has consistently delivered the opposite of its stated goals, with the poor and marginalised hit hardest.

• The Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime also admits the international drug control system has massive ‘unintended consequences’ including: creating a huge criminal market; displacing policy from health to enforcement; and geographical displacement (the ‘balloon effect’).

• At a time of economic stricture, it is crucial that drugs expenditure is cost-effective, with all potential alternatives meaningfully explored. Transform’s cost-benefit analysis (based on Government data) shows a move to legal regulation and control could:

o Save the UK billions of pounds to spend on other priorities
o Halve property crime and the prison population
o Remove a huge obstacle to development and security in Afghanistan and beyond

• Using Impact Assessment as a guiding tool would help end the emotive and polarised debate around drug policy reform, and enable politicians to genuinely engage with the search for better alternatives.

Appendix

Introduction
We all share the common goal of a drug policy that maximises environmental, physical, psychological and social wellbeing worldwide. Yet, whether viewed internationally or domestically, the prohibitionist approach has seen drug supply and availability increasing; use of drugs that cause the most harm increasing; health harms increasing; and massive levels of crime leading to a crisis in our criminal justice systems. Illicit drug profits are enriching criminals, fuelling conflict and undermining security and development in producer and transit countries from Mexico and Guinea Bissau, to Afghanistan and Colombia, with the gravest impacts falling upon the poor and marginalised.

Whilst the UNODC acknowledges the high costs of prohibition, it has so far neglected to count them, or model alternatives. Similarly, the Home Office acknowledges that legal regulation of drug markets would have benefits , but claims they would be outweighed by the costs. Yet no such cost-benefit analysis has ever been carried out in the UK, or anywhere else. Value for money studies commissioned in 2007 remain unpublished.

The UK could take the lead by carrying out an objective, independent, national assessment, comparing current policy with the alternatives; encourage other consumer, producer and transit countries to follow suit; and call for international assessments by the EC and UN.

A UK Impact Assessment
In the UK, drug legislation has changed little since the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act (MDA) which has for many years been colliding with dramatically changed circumstances, including a massive increase in the use of illegal drugs, and a correspondingly huge illegal market, compounded by globalisation. As a result, a root and branch review is long overdue, and an Impact Assessment of the MDA should form the first step in genuinely assessing the UK’s approach to drugs.

Through allowing the outcomes of any government intervention to be assessed against the goals it is supposed to meet, along with modelling alternatives, IA is a sophisticated tool to strengthen evidence-based policy-making, improve accountability and transparency, and enable more informed public and parliamentary debate. Typically IAs now consider the potential or actual impacts (positive and negative) of a policy in terms of the three pillars of sustainable development – economic, social and environmental.

An IA aimed at helping to deliver evidence-based policy - behind which all stakeholders can unite - would put all options on the table, without committing any stakeholder to a specific position: from stepping up prohibition, through decriminalisation, to legal regulation and control. In addition to current mechanisms for regulating the supply of legal drugs and intoxicants, there are a variety of existing approaches to dealing with illicit drugs. These include Portugal’s decriminalisation of possession of drugs since 2001 (widely hailed as a success, including by the UNODC), the long-term large-scale maintenance prescription of heroin in Switzerland, and the Netherlands ‘coffee-shop’ system for cannabis.

The application of IA for ex post evaluation of this kind has been less common than its use in ex ante assessment of proposed new measures. However, there is now recognition of the need for more evaluation work of this kind, for example in the European Commission work on IA.

When an entire UK Act is subject to Impact Assessment it is often broken down into smaller sections each of which has a separate IA. For example the Police and Crime Bill currently before Parliament has twenty separate IAs addressing different aspects.

The UNODC currently send out a biannual survey to member countries as part of its information gathering for the World Drug Report. Transform would like to see this include a template with questions for a country level IA, which could be collated as the basis for a global IA.

An Impact Assessment is Overdue
An IA of drug policy would be in line with Government guidelines. For example, the Treasury Green Book states that: "...no policy, programme or project is adopted without first having the answer to these questions: (1) Are there better ways to achieve this objective? (2) Are there better uses for these resources?"

More specifically, BERR IA guidelines say that all new legislation and policy changes with a cost or benefit to the public, private or third sectors greater than £5 million require the relevant government department to conduct an IA. This threshold has been crossed by many individual drug related interventions, and a number of other triggers have been pulled including: “When review leads to the identification of new policy challenges (perhaps arising from unintended consequences of the intervention itself), the [IA] process begins again."

Similarly, the National Audit Office 2001 guide ‘Modern Policymaking: Ensuring policies deliver value for money’ states: “Departments…need to review policies, for example to determine when the time is right to modify a policy in response to changing circumstances so that it remains relevant and cost effective; and departments may need to terminate policies if they are no longer cost effective or they are not delivering the policy outcomes intended.”

As previously noted there are huge unintended consequences of the current drug control system, and evidence shows the MDA is not delivering what it was supposed to - for example a twenty-fold increase in heroin use.

There is a UK precedent for using IA to compare prohibition with decriminalisation or legal regulation of drugs. The 2005 Drugs Act had an Impact Assessment of the proposal to make Magic Mushrooms a Class A drug, including the option of allowing licensed sales.

For too long the debate around drugs policy reform has been paralysed and polarised. An Impact Assessment offers an objective, independent and neutral tool for enabling key stakeholders to work together to create a drug policy fit for the 21st Century.

See also from the Transform blog:

• MP calls for Impact Assessment of drugs policy in prime ministers questions
  
  
• Transform publishes cost benefit analysis study of prohibition / regulation