The Times newspaper called for drugs including ecstasy and mephedrone to be legalised and ‘sold in small quantities in controlled environments, such as clubs’, this week, arguing that such a policy would ‘responsible’ rather than ‘shocking’.
“Nothing we do will alter the central, inescapable fact that people take drugs because they enjoy them,” Times senior columnist Melanie Reid suggested.
“Quite simply, large swaths of the young — and often the not-so-young — have an irresistible desire to get out of their heads on a Friday night. Be it right or wrong, that’s a fact of life,” she noted.
The Times’ article explicitly endorsed suggestions made by drugs expert Professor Nutt who said in the Daily Mirror this week ‘we regulate other drugs, alcohol and tobacco. Why are we so hostile to new drugs?
"One way of reducing drug harm may be to regulate their use in controlled environments,” the Professor added, “Maybe we would allow clubs to sell small amounts of drugs, like mephedrone and ecstasy, in a safe environment, just like we sell alcohol,” he suggested.
The proposal emerged just as Labour Home Secretary Alan Johnson announced plans to criminalise Mephadrone under fasttrack plans, making it a Class B drug within weeks.
"I am also taking immediate action to limit supply by banning the importation of mephedrone; sending a clear warning to suppliers about their responsibilities,” he said in a statement issued through the Home Office, “And using the Government's successful Frank campaign to warn young people about its dangers,” he added.
Civil liberties group Release was unimpressed.
“There is no doubt that the wild alarm sweeping through the media and politics has driven this process along at breakneck speed, riding roughshod over the procedural requirements imposed by the law,” they said.
“This is government by panic, and it does not bode well for democracy.”
http://tinyurl.com/yabz5j7 (Release)
The Times article in full: http://tinyurl.com/yl7p9rd
Jonty Skrufff (http://skrufff.com): Follow Jonty on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/jontyskrufff
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