The Drug Problem: part 1
Over the last few weeks we have been considering the purpose of imprisonment. The various suggestions have been made as to both the purpose of imprisonment and steps which could be taken to reduce the prison population. However drastic measures are required if the prison population is to be manageable at the same time as ensuring that violent offenders or repeat offenders are dealt with in a fashion that the public would legitimately regard as acceptable.
There is one obvious area which needs to be addressed. That is drugs. I am not a fan of drugs. I have never taken illegal drugs. However if there is a war on drugs it has conspicuously failed. That is the case by whichever measure you seek to assess the way the problem has been dealt with. Drugs are still used. They routinely used by young people, and by many others. Since they are illegal there is no proper way of regulating or certifying the content. Nor is it easy to deal with people with a drug problem with quite the same effectiveness that could be achieved if drugs were legal. Huge amounts of police time are spent trying to prevent the importation of drugs. The drugs still arrive, however many successful seizures there are. Drug rings will be smashed but there are always others to take their place. Organised crime grows fat on the profits of drug trade, meaning that they can consolidate their position so as to expand into other areas. Users commit crimes to fund their habit. The cycle is both vicious and relentless.
There is one word which shows the immense difficulty of dealing with this problem. Prohibition. The story of prohibition is well known and yet it is remarkable that none of the lessons seemed to have been learned. Prohibition of alcohol in the United States did not stop people drinking. It merely ensured that vast profits were made by organised crime in supplying the needs that people had. If a significant section of the population want something and you criminalise it, they will still want it, and ways will be found to make sure that they get it. The law can do many things, but abolishing the law of supply and demand is not one of them. Too many people have too much interest in obtaining the drugs for it to be feasible to stop them.
Although the wider social implications will be addressed next week, for the moment I wish to consider the effect on the prison population. No one sent to prison for possessing drugs. No imprisonment for the hapless mules used to import drugs. Albeit that drugs would be taxed, they would be cheaper, and those who were addicts could be dealt with through hospital programmes. It would be most unlikely that there would be the same pressure for addicts to commit crimes to fund their habits. Nor would it be likely that users would be unaware of the nature and strength of the drugs they were using. People will too stupid and dangerous things. At least legalisation will allow them to make an informed choice.
If people are going to use drugs then it is surely right to make them as safe as possible to use. That is an important social imperative which can hardly be left to the representatives of organised crime. This would also mean that those who do use drugs can be treated as persons in need of support and where necessary medical help, rather than as criminals. The amount of police time that this would free up would allow more effective and visible policing with a view to the prevention as well as detection of crime. It should also reduce the prison population so as to mean that there is a better chance of both having the room for those prisoners who need to be locked up, as well as the resources to seriously try to rehabilitate those offenders where rehabilitation is realistic.
Solving a crisis often involves thinking the unthinkable. The war on drugs will never be won. A rethink would be an important starting point in solving the prison problem.