Media/News > Press Releases > 12.10.04

MP welcomes groundbreaking report on drug legalisation at House of Commons seminar


The report, titled ‘After the War on Drugs, Options for Control', will be officially launched at an evening seminar in Portcullis House, on Wednesday October 13th. The seminar will be attended by key figures in the drugs field, including MPs and Peers, civil servants, academics, police and NGO representatives. The event will be chaired by Polly Toynbee (the Guardian) and will feature presentations from a distinguished panel of speakers:

Paul Flynn MP - Vice Chairman, All Party Group on Drug Misuse
Simon Jenkins - Former Editor, The Times, columnist The Times and London Evening Standard
Oona King MP - Parliamentary Private Secretary to Patricia Hewitt, Department of Trade and Industry (see 2 in notes to editors below)
Lord Benjamin Mancroft - Chairman, Mentor UK
Baroness Vivien Stern - Senior Research Fellow at the International Centre for Prison Studies
Chris White - Former Inspector and Drugs Co-ordinator, Tayside Police


Paul Flynn MP said:

“Transform's report is of enormous significance.  This is the first practical road map for a benign drug policy that must follow the collapse of drug prohibition.”

Danny Kushlick, Transform director said:

“Drugs will be legalised in the not too distant future because prohibition is an ongoing catastrophe of startling proportions.  Crime is doubled and the Government estimates crime costs at £16 billion a year. The drugs discourse at the party conferences was stuck in the tough talking rhetoric of old.  However, there is a groundswell of interest in looking beyond the drug war, to consider alternative policy options that will be more effective, just and humane. As the failure of enforcement based prohibition
becomes ever more obvious people want to talk about the options for government control of drug markets in the post prohibition era.

“The level of interest in this event, from such a broad spectrum of groups and individuals, shows that drug policy reform has at last found its place on the mainstream political agenda. This is an issue whose time has come.

“This new report is the first effort to examine these options in any detail, pointing the way forward, as well as discussing the key themes in the reform debate and responding to popular concerns about legalisation and government regulation of currently illegal drugs.”

Notes to editors

1. The report ‘After the War on Drugs - Options for Control' is available for download (in pdf format) from www.tdpf.org.uk . (Printed copies are available on request).

2. Please note that Oona King MP has only expressed support for legalisation of cannabis and attended the event to show support for the debate around drug policy reform generally rather than to express support for all contents of the Transforms new report or for Transform's broader position on drug law reform.

3. From the report introduction:

“If you are around in 2020, the chances are that will see drugs prohibition replaced with a system of regulated and controlled markets. If Transform's timeline is right, by 2020 the criminal market will have been forced to relinquish its control of the drug trade and government regulation and control will be the norm once more. Users will no longer ‘score' from unregulated dealers. They will buy their drugs from specialist pharmacists or licensed retailers. Or, for those with a clinical need, via a prescription. At its simplest, that is what legalisation, control and regulation will mean - shopping and visiting the doctor. It is simply a question of transferring the policy paradigm of management and regulation to currently illegal drugs. This report provides the detail behind this simple vision”