An audience of more than 600 people at a forum debate in Sydney on May 10 voted by a margin of 69% to 23%, that, "All drugs should be legalised."
The forum was sponsored by Intelligence2, a project of the St James Ethics Centre. It heard arguments for and against the proposal and questions and comments from the audience.
Dr Alex Wodak, president of the Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation, and a founder of Australia's first needle exchange, argued: "As a starting point, we must recognise that the ‘war on drugs’ has failed. Legalisation is the only answer.
"Drug use has increased markedly under prohibition. Prohibition pushes people into the arms of organised crime. Money is rained down on customs, police and law enforcement, while drug rehabilitation programs are starved of funds.
"We must remove the oxygen of illicit profits from the drug system. The question of drugs is a health and safety issue, not a criminal issue.”
Dr Greg Pike, director of the Southern Cross Bioethics Institute in Adelaide, said that "legalisation equals normalisation, which would lead to increased availability and acceptability of drugs".
Nicholas Cowdrey, former NSW Director of Public Prosecutions said: "Drugs should be legalised, not normalised. Legalisation would mean regulation of drugs, merely the removal of prohibition. The criminal law is not a good method to regulate health and social behaviour.”
Jade Lewis, a former addict and campaigner against illegal drugs, presented her personal struggle as a case for the continued prohibition of drugs.
Comedian Wendy Harmer said the major reason to legalise drugs was to "reduce hypocrisy" and undercut the "law and order junkies" who are the real problem in society.
Journalist Paul Sheehan spoke against legalisation of drugs on the grounds that the present situation was acceptable and said there is no “war on drugs” in Australia.
In discussion, most participants rejected this argument, asserting that there is a real “war on drugs” and that it is failing here and overseas. One speaker said that "20,000 people are arrested over drug use in NSW alone, every year".
Another speaker proposed "all the money now allocated to drug law enforcement” should be spent on “drug rehabilitation and health programs".
[The next debate in the Intelligence2 series will be on June 16 at 6.45pm at City Recital Hall, on the topic: "WikiLeaks is a force for good." Visit: http://iq2oz.com/ ]
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