| Dear
Mr Howard,
Until
the last election, I had voted Liberal for 30 years.
I am hoping to be able to do so again since I generally
support your party's economic policies. But until you
adopt more progressive social policies, this appears
a forlorn hope.
In
particular, your approach to the heroin problem is regressive,
reactionary and anti-social. In my view, the course
you are taking will only lead further down the disastrous
road the nation and its drug users have embarked on.
If the problem is to be contained. it is essential that
you permit and encourage shooting galleries, and also
allow heroin to be sold on prescription. Until this
happens:
1.
The crime wave will continue and accelerate, with people
like us being burgled with increasing frequency so that
drug users can raise sufficient funds to support their
habit.
2.
Young people will continue to die from overdoses and
drug mixing at a horrifying rate, which is reported
to have risen from about 2 per million before prohibition
to 80 to 120 per million now.
3.
The high profits from drug dealing will accrue mainly
to organised crime, allowing them to acquire an ever-increasing
share of the nation's capital.
4.
The nation's courts will be bogged down with drug-related
crime.
5.
Many of our young generation (at least those who do
not die from overdoses) will be stigmatised by criminal
conviction and often permanently alienated from society.
6.
The country's jails will continue to overflow, mainly
with the young and minorities who are more likely to
buy and fix on the streets.
It
is way past time that your government recognised that
drugs are a social and health problem and not a criminal
one. I expect you also are aware that prohibition is
bound to fail sooner or later. By legalising heroin
and selling controlled amounts and qualities on prescription.
you will solve at a stroke many of the problems listed.
Your
argument that legalising heroin necessarily sends a
bad message to society is rubbish. Cigarette consumption
in Australia is declining steadily as the message that
it is damaging to health sinks in. A similar but much
stronger campaign is needed for heroin to prevent the
young from becoming addicted and to help them quit.
At present it is the very illegality of both soft and
hard drugs that makes them seem socially desirable in
some circles.
The
only argument that I can see against legalisation is
that America is opposed to it and is pressuring other
countries and the UN to adopt its position. The US in
fact is probably one of the few developed countries
that is less enlightened than Australia in its national
drugs policy, though many States are seeking to liberalise
their laws, particularly in relation to soft drugs.
I
sincerely urge you to reconsider your and your government's
position before you do even more harm to our society
than you and your predecessor governments have already
done. At the very least, you should not oppose the States
and Territories in their more enlightened approaches.
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