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Paul Goodman, "Focus on Drugs: Legalise it .. all of it" - The Government has declared war on drugs. But the gangs seem to be winning. Paul Goodman argues that their success menaces the very fabric of society - and that legalisation is the only answer, The Sunday Telegraph, 7^th May 1995

THE Government is due to publish its White Paper on drugs this Wednesday. It will broadly endorse the strategy set out in Tackling Drugs Together, the Green Paper of last year. This has three main objectives. First, to reduce the demand for illegal drugs in Britain, through education, treatment, and rehabilitation programmes. Second, to cut the supply of these drugs from abroad, by encouraging producers to replace drugs crops with substitutes. Third, to punish the suppliers who, by trying to match demand and supply, break the law.

The Government likes to call this strategy the 'war against drugs'. This martial label is a bit misleading, since an essential of war is to know your enemy, and ministers seem unsure who the enemy is - the consumers of illegal drugs here, the producers abroad, or the suppliers (who are usually linked to the drug mafias). One thing is clear: whoever the enemy is, he seems to be prospering mightily.

Demand is soaring. According to surveys, drugs are percolating into mainstream culture, especially among young people. Three million people use cannabis each year. In inner cities, 44 per cent of 20-24-year-olds report having taken drugs at some time. In prisons, drug use is rampant, and compulsory tests have been introduced; the Green Paper proposed education programmes for children in primary schools.

This rise in demand is apparently being matched by supply. In 1992, a record amount of cocaine was confiscated. Seizures of LSD rose by 55 per cent on the previous year; of ecstasy, by 40 per cent; of heroin, by 10 per cent. Most of the pounds 536 million spent here on the 'war against drugs' aims to restrict supply, through Customs, controls, and international action. In one sense, these figures are meaningless: no one really knows what quantity of illegal drugs is consumed in Britain each year, and by how many people; how many drugs enter the country, or are produced here; or the real cost of drugs to the economy - to the prison, social, and probation services; in insurance, private security, and police costs; in benefits, through crime, or in hard-to-calculate costs such as losses of workforce efficiency.

But faster communications, easier travel, open borders, and freer markets worldwide have undoubtedly transformed the drug business into an even greater money-spinner.

According to Interpol, it is now the world's second biggest, after the arms trade, worth pounds 260 billion, of which pounds 50 billion is laundered into the global financial system.

The 1960s saw the emergence of the Euro-dollar; the 1990s is seeing that of the narco-dollar. Western governments, attempting to restrict supply by subsidising crop substitution in the Third World, are allegedly being outbid by gangs with billions at their disposal.

The effects of the drug boom are being felt closer to home. Our cities are being slowly transformed, with some districts becoming no-go areas. Paisley, near Glasgow, saw five gun-related incidents in 48 hours during March, eliciting a striking sentence in a newspaper report: 'Police said yesterday that they were in control of the streets of Paisley'. Is the maintenance of law and order in a British city so unusual as to force such a comment? The mafias have not yet, as they have in some EC countries, successfully infiltrated mainstream politics. But the prospect of their doing so can no longer be dismissed as absurd. The drug trade now menaces not simply our economic and social development, but the very stability of our political order and constitutional settlement. And its most formidable agent turns out to be the 'war against drugs' itself. Demand cannot be substantially reduced nor supply cut, however high taxes are raised to achieve both aims. More importantly, by declaring certain drugs illegal - thereby simultaneously creating a black market and raising their price - the Government is pouring money into the pockets of the dealers.

The 'war against drugs' is the political equivalent of thrashing about in quicksand: the harder it is fought, the worse the defeat. If this is a war, the mafias are the only possible winner.

Plainly, things cannot go on as they are. So what is to be done? Any alternative drug policy must answer three questions. What are its implications for the taxpayer? Will it smash the gangs? And do its public benefits outweigh the social costs? The foundation of such an alternative can only be some change to the drug laws. The liberalisation lobby likes to claim that the relaxation of controls surrounding one drug (that under consideration is usually cannabis) would not be accompanied by increased use, or by consumers moving on from soft drugs to hard ones. What evidence there is suggests otherwise. In Holland, where cannabis has been effectively decriminalised since 1976, use has risen. During the Vietnam war, American troops turned to heroin in their thousands.

So, even if drug use per person remained constant in the event of relaxation, the costs created by more users (in rehabilitation, prevention and, possibly, more street disturbances) would have to be set against any potential savings - in Customs, controls and, probably, less burglaries. In this context, the question of decriminalisation or legalisation would be crucial. Legalisation would enable tax revenues to be raised from the sale of new drugs; decriminalisation would not.

Indeed, decriminalisation - whether of one drug or many - looks to provide the worst of both worlds. It would not make major savings, since it would fail to break the mafias, which would still have the black markets in other drugs to do business in.

Tony Banks, the Labour MP who has previously spoken up for decriminalisation, concedes that 'legalisation would be easier, and there is a case for it. I want politicians to take a look at the whole subject'. The advantage of legalisation is that, properly managed, it would damage the gangs as severely as the end of prohibition did in the United States. Cocaine, for example, is usually impure, always costly (its rises 200 fold between the coca farm in Columbia and the streets of London, to the profit of the gangs) and inconvenient to obtain. Approved providers could undercut the price, guarantee quality, and ensure ease of supply.

Sean Gabb, editor of the libertarian journal Free Life, would begin legalisation by reverting to the old British system (a trace of which survives in the power possessed by a handful of GPs to prescribe heroin) of using doctors as providers. 'I would legalise everything immediately, rather than giving the mafia time to go respectable,' he said.

However, such a course would be expensive, and - were doctors to limit prescriptions - the black market could linger on. Dr Richard Stephenson, of Liverpool University, believes that the medical profession would not want to shoulder the burden, and that the cigarette companies would probably step in.

He also queries whether registered drug users should be described as addicts: 'Drug users aren't ill - they just like the stuff,' he said. This is the nub of the matter. The legalisation lobby argues that some hard drugs are not necessarily more harmful than alcohol or nicotine; that most drug users are not addicts; that the late 19th century saw large-scale drug consumption coinciding happily with social order in Britain; and that we are already a drug-using society: the largest component of the pounds 3.8 billion NHS medicines bill is treatments for the nervous system, including anti-depressants.

The majority, however, is horrified even by discussion of legalisation. Is it right, it asks, for the state to permit something of which it so deeply disapproves? What would the impact of legalisation be on everyday life (on parental authority, for example)? Would it not turn Britain into the drug capital of Europe? Above all, it senses that a nation which approves the use of drugs on such a scale would be a decadent one. It hears echoes of the fall of Rome, as described by Gibbon. It glimpses a frightening and alienating world.

In all this, it is almost certainly right. But the question is not whether we wish to live in a world in which drug use is part of the mainstream culture. For better or worse, such a world is the one we will soon inhabit. The question, rather, is whether it is to be dominated by the mafias or not, making the maintenance of civilised life impossible. If such an end is to be avoided, legalisation - with advertising controls, limited outlets, age controls, and state approval of operators - is the only route now open. Certainly, our international obligations must be taken into account. Nevertheless, legalisation must come - and the sooner the better.

The Sunday Telegraph
Copyright (C) Telegraph Group Ltd, 1987-1997

Jenny Shields, "Rightwingers tell Cullen adults should have all guns they want", The Sunday Times, London, 23^rd June 1996

A RIGHT-WING organisation is calling for the immediate repeal of all firearms regulations in a submission to the Cullen inquiry into the Dunblane tragedy. It conceded yesterday that the parents of children killed and injured in the massacre might find its views 'grossly offensive'. In its submission to the inquiry, the Libertarian Alliance argues that any adult should be able to buy as many guns and as much ammunition as they can afford without showing any permit or identification, be allowed to store their weapons at home and carry them freely in public 'for the protection of life, liberty and property'.

Other submissions which have not been heard at the inquiry, but which will be considered by Lord Cullen, include one from the Scottish Shooters' Rights Association which says the calibre and capacity of the guns used by killer Thomas Hamilton were 'irrelevant'.

Cullen's invitation to interested parties to send written submissions to his inquiry has resulted in an avalanche of paperwork. The bulk of the 120 submissions received, which are not read out at the inquiry, are from official bodies, but many come from individuals such as shooting enthusiasts, psychologists, retired police officers and landowners. It was requested that submissions focused on gun control, school security and the vetting of people working with youngsters but, predictably, it is the gun-control issue which dominates the responses.

Interested parties range from deregulationists such as the Libertarian Alliance to the Snowdrop Petition formed by parents in the Stirling area in the aftermath of Dunblane who seek a total ban on the private ownership of guns.

The alliance, formed in 1979 to promote a broad range of 'libertarian, classical-liberal and free-market ideas', warns that Hamilton's slaughter of 16 children and their teacher 'should not be used to justify the extension or tightening up of existing legal controls of firearms'.

Sean Gabb, a founder member of the alliance and editor of its quarterly magazine, Free Life, said yesterday: 'I have children and I have every sympathy for the Dunblane parents who have suffered a great personal disaster. After something as traumatic as this it is natural to cry out for harsh and punitive action, and I daresay the parents might find our stand grossly offensive. But change in legislation needs to be considered with a cool mind, because what you might want in the heat of the moment is not real justice.'

Speaking from his home in Greenwich, London, Gabb, a university law lecturer, added: 'Tougher gun controls would not have prevented Hamilton doing what he did. Burglars, street criminals, bank robbers and psychotics like Hamilton will take no notice. These people will get hold of guns regardless. All gun-control laws do are disarm honest citizens in the face of criminal aggression and predation.'

Gabb maintains that many people in Britain's mainstream gun lobby support such views but are 'too scared to speak up. If they do, they fear the police will come round and remove their guns on some technicality. I don't possess any firearms so I am free to take this position'.

The Police Federation, which represents 126,000 rank and file officers in England and Wales, last week announced it was seeking a total ban on the private ownership of handguns in the wake of Dunblane.

Its Scottish counterpart, in a submission with the Asso-ciation of Chief Police Officers, stops short of calling for a total ban but wants all multiple-shot weapons prohibited, the establishment of a central gun register and legislation to allow easier revocation of licences. In its submission, the Preparatory Schools Rifle Association claims that: 'Learning about the safe handling of firearms at an early age, far from encouraging laxity, teaches appreciation of the potential dangers that they offer.'

The British Shooting Sports Council, writing on behalf of 10 other organisations, said a 'mystique' had grown up around firearms and their private possession which was portrayed as 'unhealthy and outside the limits of acceptability and normality within British society'. It claims that despite a lack of supporting evidence, there was a 'continued linking of legitimately held firearms to the problems of armed crime', and adds that the most important element of the equation was 'the individual and not the firearm itself'.

The Scottish committee of the Shooters' Rights Association said it wanted all suitable persons to maintain the right to obtain and safely keep weapons in their possession. Its submission also observes that 'the calibre and capacity of a firearm is largely irrelevant in circumstances where only one person is armed, as was the case in Dunblane'.

At the end of the fourth week of the inquiry, Cullen started to hear expert witnesses. On Friday, Alistair Paton, one of country's foremost firearms experts, demonstrated the use of a 9mm Browning, similar to the one Hamilton used to kill his victims. Hamilton had modified the weapons to make them more effective.

The inquiry also heard how a 'gut feeling' about Hamilton led George Robertson, the shadow Scottish secretary, to remove his youngest son from one of the Dunblane boys' clubs run by the killer, and of his later despair when he learnt that the Ombudsman had upheld the gunman's complaints against the local council. Cullen also heard from Michael Forsyth, the Scottish secretary, who had been 'bombarded' with letters from Hamilton. Ian Boal, a student who had helped at one of the clubs, described how the killer's growing obsession with firearms grew in the weeks leading up to the murders. Graeme MacGregor, a long-standing associate of Hamilton's, told how nine days before the massacre on March 13, Hamilton had bought two shirts on his credit card boasting: 'The beauty is I will not have to pay for them ever.'

The inquiry is expected to finish in about two weeks.

Sean Gabb, Letter to the Editor: More guns, less crime, The Sunday Telegraph, London, 6^th April 1997

I was astonished to read John Simpson's article 'An antidote to the Kalashnikov's power is overdue' (March 30).

Mr Simpson's main point is the usual one - that the world is a better place when the only people allowed to have guns are also wearing government uniforms. Whenever common people get hold of weapons, anarchy results. This is an inaccuracy so often and comprehensively refuted that it is almost worth being called a lie.

In this country before 1920 there were no controls on the civilian possession of firearms. There was very little armed crime. In modern Switzerland every able-bodied male must keep an 'assault rifle' in his home, and train in its use. The market in handguns is almost unregulated. Switzerland has very little armed crime.

Armed men in uniform have killed about a hundred million people this century, many of them women and children. Mr Simpson makes a reference to Auschwitz that in the context is astonishingly tasteless. The Holocaust happened in societies where the people had been comprehensively disarmed by their rulers.

The same point can be made about the Armenians, the Kulaks, the 50 million Chinese murdered by the communists - and the Albanians Mr Simpson affects such pity for. Every despotic government disarms its victims. It oppresses them itself, or it leaves them so incapable of resistance that other criminals can wander among them like a fox through chickens. Sean Gabb London SE7

Julian Myers, Letters to the Editor, "Thin end of the privacy wedge", Connected, Daily Telegraph, London, 5^th March 1998

I was pleased to see Connected publicise the Government's plans for controlling the use of encryption technology ('Privacy row over encryption law', February 26). There has indeed been much speculation on the Internet (most effectively from Sean Gabb of the Libertarian Alliance) about the possible nature of, and the claimed need for, legislation. Labour's plans for a voluntary scheme are, of course, only the start. After a 'respectable' period they will announce that the voluntary scheme is not working and 'regretfully' introduce laws to back it up. At this point all will probably be lost.

The integrity of those corporate bodies who dare to protest will be impugned using arguments such as 'If you're not criminals what have you got to hide?' Against private individuals simple innuendo will suffice.

We should ask ourselves the question 'Why a voluntary scheme?' The answer could be that the argument, and therefore the need, for legal enforcement is not strong enough. Or it could be that the Government's motives are ulterior and would not stand the public airing necessary to pass a law? A poor choice.

Julian Myers Julian@velodog.demon.co.uk