The press, recovery, prison and politicians, all in one week.

The Daily Mail, never a paper to let the truth get in the way of a good story at the best of times, really went to town this week by exposing a new threat posed by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The rag reported on Thursday that the good old RAF had helped protect this country by destroying a vast cache of hash by bombing it with aircraft.

This is the sort of macho drug enforcement that prohibitionists get all excited about of course, something the likes of Gordon Brown can only dream about using in the UK. But what really made the Mail look stupid – more stupid than normal – is the justification they claimed for this machismo stunt:

According to the Daily Mail

Officials believe the area – near to the Taliban stronghold of Quetta in Pakistan – was turning dried cannabis leaves into heroin.

Now OK, we all know the Mail makes stories about drugs up with little or no regard to facts, but this is one claim too far. The only possible explanation for that is they did a cut and paste job on some press release and didn’t bother to check.

According to the Mail’s website – the page linked to above:

No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts?

So, if it were ever in doubt, the Daily Mail does lie because they most certainly have had comments about this item, they just decided not to print them. This would be quite funny had this particular paper not been so influential in shaping the present government’s policy toward cannabis. But more about the government later.

There was some interesting blog activity this week concerning the role of the criminal law in drug rehabilitation – or to use the new jargon “recovery”. An interesting debate popped up on “The prof speaks out” blog: Risk and substance use – the impact of drug laws. The “prof” is David Clark, the director of the respected “Wired in” and home of the “Daily dose” news service. The focus of this debate was whether workers in the recovery field could be a part of the prohibition regime. Although David didn’t want to get drawn into the law reform debate (it seems to be a touchy subject for drug workers), he did make these comments:

Let me be aware, criminalising drug users does not help people overcome drug problems, it does not facilitate recovery.
However, decriminalising all drug use will not lead to the disappearance of the so-called drug problem.
Placing the treatment system within the criminal justice sector is totally wrong. It sends out completely the wrong message and demonstrates a clear prejudical attitude of government. I would be delighted to argue this case to Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg if they would give me some of their time.

Of course no-one is claiming decriminalising drug use would solve all the problems, but as the prof seems to accept treating such drug users as criminals is utterly counter productive.

Interestingly as well, Peter O’Loughlin – a well know critic of law reform conceded that

Anyone in the recovery business who regards ‘problem users as criminals is in the wrong business. We do not have the right to judge others. We do have a responsibility to help them achieve recovery, if that is what they want.

This is clearly an issue those in the drug advice industry have to sort out and come off the fence over. Are they a part of the government policy of criminalisation or not? They are after all a part of the present drugs strategy and are playing a key role in it. Worse news for people in the field who are genuinely motivated to do good work is that the rhetoric of “recovery” is being used now by those promoting hard line prohibition under the mantra of enforced abstinence.

Calls to legalise cannabis came this week from The Scottish Futures Forum (SFF) (pdf doc) . Transform’s Danny Kushlick welcomed the recommendations:

‘…it points to the overwhelming and urgent need for policy makers to join up thinking across disciplines and departments to develop a cohesive plan for dealing with the reality of drug use in the 21st century.’

To its enormous credit the Futures Forum has… embraced wholeheartedly the taboo area of the prohibition regulation continuum… The fact that it has recognized the counter productivity of an enforcement-led approach and the enormous benefits of a public health approach will put further pressure on unreasonable tough on drugs rhetoric from vote hungry politicians… Overwhelmingly what the report argues for is science over rhetoric and for democratic input above all.’

“embraced wholeheartedly the taboo area of the prohibition regulation continuum” – yeah ok, we know what you mean Danny, I think, except of course there isn’t a “continuum” between regulation and prohibition, there’s a deep chasm.

But of course, this whole report drew a predictable response from Scotland’s promoter of hard line prohibition and leader of the Tory group Annabell Goldie. She described the report as “flawed” and “The taxing and regulation of cannabis is akin to legalisation. Well done Annabel, you’re right, it is only by legalisation that cannabis can be controlled. But then Annabell Goldie is one of these strange people who preaches law and order, but promotes the very cause of anarchy and crime by supporting the drug war, she is one of those who use the mantra of ‘recovery’ to mean ‘enforced abstinence’. She probably reads the Mail.

A big problem came for the lock ’em up crew this weeks though with a report by the Centre of Policy Studies published Monday (June 9th) by Huseyin Djemil, former Drug Strategy Co-ordinator for seven London Prisons – previously himself a heroin and crack cocaine addict.

The report was called ‘Inside Out: How to get drugs out of prisons’ and is online here . The government made it clear they didn’t like this report, but then they would, wouldn’t they, it’s highlighting yet another disastrous aspect of their drugs policy.

It was reviewed by the “Transform” blog and to quote from them again:

Djemil himself argues that, ‘The demand for drugs is so great and the system so porous that this [mandatory drug testing, CCTV etc] will only cause minor disruption. Drug dealers in contrast are organised, highly motivated, clearly focused. They build effective alliances for mutual benefit and profit. As their resources grow, so does their buying power – and their capability to corrupt more staff.’

While demand is a factor, the real reason that staff can be corrupted and drug dealers are ‘highly motivated’ to smuggle drugs into prisons, is that prohibition inflates prices way beyond their true worth.

‘Revealed: how drugs trade took hold of British prisons’ notes that:

’14 Staff suspended at Pentonville prison in 2006 amid claims of drug and mobile phone smuggling;
68 Staff suspended from the prison service in 2006;
1,000 Prison staff suspected of corruption’

The article also claims that the drugs trade in British prisons is worth an estimated £59 million.

There is another report about this on Ch4 news here, which includes the TV report.

Such is the damage the drug war is causing to this country. Interestingly a report from PriceWaterhouseCoopers has made it clear that the idea of “drug free prisons” is a non starter, it’s just too expensive. As if that wasn’t enough, as well as featuring in Huseyin Djemil’s report, the BMJ twists the knife on drug testing, stating

A substantial reported decline in prison drug misuse in recent years may be illusory: a report has suggested that prisoners may be learning how to cheat the random tests. It also says that such testing in prisons may be driving prisoners towards harder drugs.

Prohibition is close to crisis, yet politicians and the media cling to it as if it were the only option. Yet if they can’t make it work in prisons, what chance is there of making it stick in the wider society indeed.

The final twist this week came from the arch prohibitionist and mastermind of the proposed Tory drug war, David Davis. He’s stepped down form his shadow Home Secretary job to fight a by-election on the platform of protecting our freedoms following the vote of 42 day detention. Honestly, you couldn’t make this up.