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Contents

Introduction

1. Spreading the Word

• Tools
• Media Highlights
• Events

2. UK News

• Cannabis Reclassification
• Drugs Consultation

2. International News

• The Americas
• African Continent
• Asia
• Australasia

4. What You Can Do

• Donate
• Internet Activity
• Recruitment (Including current job vacancy)

g the Word

1.) Spreading the Word

Tools

Finally our beautiful new document, After the War on Drugs; Tools for the Debate, has been published! It has been a long time in the making, but we believe well worth the effort. This new guide makes is designed to:

• reframe and re-conceptualise the debate
• provide the language and analysis to challenge the prohibitionist status quo, and argues for evidence-based alternatives.

The first stage of our dissemination strategy is already complete with copies sent to all parliamentarians, and a range of media, NGO and government contacts. The feedback we’ve received so far has been overwhelmingly positive. We hope that this guidebook will achieve its aim and revolutionise the way drugs policy is talked about in the future.

Tools is available to download free in pdf format here, or if you’d rather a hard copy we can send one to you at the cost of £5 to cover our printing and postage costs.

Media highlights

We’ve had a busy couple of months with the media, and our profile is seemingly higher than ever before. For example, as the political storm blew up around the reclassification of cannabis, (yes, it's still going on) Transform were consulted by BBC News 24, ITN News, Sky breakfast news, Sky lunchtime news, Channel 4 news, along with BBC Radio 4 and Radio 1, and a bunch of local radio stations - all in one day.

In addition, Steve wrote an article for The Guardian ‘Medical use of Afghanistan's opium won't solve the problem’ in which he argued that prescribed heroin for long-term addicts would be a better way of reducing the trade. Steve also had a feature on cannabis potency, in the specialist journal Alcohol and Drugs Today -to which he is now a regular contributor.

Transform was also featured in Politics.co.uk, Government Drug Policy 'Spinning failure into success' and Danny spoke on BBC Radio show ‘Law in Action’ on the problems of the current drug laws.

A number of major broadsheet journalists have also written articles in favour of drug law reform, including Anatole Kaletsky writing for the Times ‘Give Peace a Chance. Forget the War on Drugs’ in which he reports on the spectacular ongoing failure of the anti-drug efforts in Afghanistan, Willem Buiter in the Financial Times in his article ‘Legalise Drugs to Beat Terrorists’ and Matthew Engels article ‘High Society’ in the Financial Times. Following on from these articles, Steve, despite not technically being one of ‘the worlds leading economists’ was invited to contribute to the guest only ‘economists forum’ on the FT website which ran a debate about prohibition and legalisation/regulation which included a very strange prohibitionist rant from Joseph Califano : comprehensively taken to pieces by Transform and the other contributors.

All very positive signs that some major UK broadsheets are getting their heads around the pragmatic arguments for progressive drug policy and law reform.

Events

Steve has just returned from Lisbon, Portugal where he has been representing Transform at an international NGO event in preparation for the UN review of their strategy in 2008/9.

Danny attended a Britdoc ‘Would Like To Meet the Campaigners’ forum, hosted by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust. This was a chance to meet 15 nationally recognised documentary producers and interest them in the Transform story. We received good feedback from a number of them and are hopeful that something will come of it.

We are currently in the process of organising our annual reception, which we are holding in the Atlee Suite of the House of Commons on October 24th. This will provide us with an opportunity to officially launch our new publication ‘Tools for the Debate’ in front of some key politicians, media and NGO contacts.

2.) UK News

Cannabis reclassification

“We are about to make changes in the cannabis law” – Gordon Brown

So once again, tiresomely enough, the issue of cannabis reclassification is centre stage, with the media in yet another of its cyclical reefer madness frenzies. The Tories have been making hay again with their ‘tough on drugs’ line, hyping the cannabis issue for all its worth. Sadly the government have risen to the bait resulting in new PM Gordon Brown revising his views from the TUC conference on the 6th June where he claimed that cannabis would not be reclassified, to his statement on 18th July when he said that he will once again be referring the issue back to the ACMD (Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs). It should be noted that the ACMD has already done two detailed cannabis evaluations (2001, 2004), both supporting the committee’s long held view that Class C is an appropriate place for cannabis to be in terms of relative harms.

It is notable that the often reticent DrugScope agree that the call for cannabis reclassification from both sides of the political centre is simply political posturing and has nothing to do with the evidence, which has remained the same for a number of years.

Oddly, the issue of classification – a technical matter for the ACMD – has been shoe horned into the ongoing drug strategy consultation process. More worryingly Gordon Brown has pre-empted both the consultation process and the ACMD report he has commissioned by saying firstly, that he wants to reclassify cannabis, and more recently that he is going to reclassify cannabis:

“We have made changes, for example, in casinos, we are about to make changes in the cannabis law, we are about to make a review happen in 24 hour drinking, all these things, it’s by listening to the people, by hearing what they say” (at a citizen’s jury event in Bristol on September the 9th, interview with Nick Robinson reported on the BBC)

So there we have it, it seems that Brown has already decided cannabis law will be changed, and this is before the consultation has even closed, or the ACMD have conducted a review. Well it’s nice to realise that Brown really is ‘listening to the people’ and ‘hearing what they are saying!’

This sorry tale of knee jerk policy making, abandonment of even the pretence of evidence based policy making, and party political football can be followed in more detail on the Transform blog here and here. Gordon Brown a conviction politician? He certainly seems to like the idea of more convictions.

Drug Consultation

The Government is currently in the midst of a major ten-year drug-strategy policy review and consultation process (A copy of the consultation document, which includes information on how to respond is available at http://drugs.homeoffice.gov.uk. Responses need to be in by 19th October – so if you want to respond – HURRY UP) . It claims to be the “biggest ever public policy consultation” in this Government’s history. Even by the very low expectations that Transform had for this consultation document, it really is a shocker. The document devotes most of its space to “spinning” statistics to claim that the Governments Strategy has been a success. For our detailed critique see: Drug Policy 1997-2007, The Evidence un-spun . Curiously it doesn’t have any actual policies on which to consult and is more in the form of a narrowly framed opinion poll, from which it is hard to see how the Government will gleam useful information. It has all the hallmarks of a tokenistic PR exercise.

Now, if the shortcomings of the document itself isn’t depressing enough, Brown has made two major announcements in the past couple of weeks, which have left us questioning what a consultation actually is? Not only has he announced that he wants cannabis to be re-re-classified (see above) but he has also announced, in his party speech, that Drugs are NEVER going to be decriminalised. Now we may have totally misunderstood the meaning of the word ‘consultation’ but we’re sure that the first rule at least is that you don’t decide on policy and announce it publicly – before the consultation has even taken place. Odd that he rules out an entire spectrum of policy thought – indeed the policy option of decriminalising possession for personal use (or de-facto decrimnalisation) has been adopted widely across mainland Europe and indeed much of the world.

Transform are currently in the process of writing a response to the consultation (which will be available to view on our website soon). Please look out for this and submit a response yourself (and encourage others to do the same). We know it’s unlikely to have much effect, but we still feel that the more people who say that the Government’s proposals for the future are wholly inadequate and set out alternate proposals for tackling drug harms the better.

3.) International News

The Americas

USA

In the USA, a major study by the University of California, Berkeley, investigated the question “Why are so many Americans in prison?”. They state that the high number of people incarcerated for drug offences in the past 20 years are a major reason. Just after this was published, the U.S. Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs and the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control, introduced legislation to eliminate the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine. However, we can still expect to see a continued rise in prison numbers, keeping the USA in pole position in the world Prison Population League, with over 2,000,000 inmates.

Check out our Fact Research Guide for UK prison stats.

Colombia

Colombia, like Bolivia, is another country intermittently suffering under the negative consequences of entirely futile and counterproductive crop eradication programs. The opposition leader Carlos Gaviria tells of the ill’s it causes the Colombian people, and predicts this unrest will spark movements towards legalisation and regulation of cocaine production. Not to be outdone, The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) Commander Raul Reyes explains his own plans for Colombia and its drugs mess.

African Continent

South Africa

The Observer reported on an international, multi-million pound illegal trade that has brought Triad gangs from China to the South African, Cape Town region. This has led to a cash-free trade developing, with abalone (a saucer sized mollusc, an endangered delicacy in the Far East) being exchanged for the ingredients to make methamphetamine. This has had catastrophic consequences on the Cape Town region including a 200 per cent increase in drug related crimes over the past two years.

Nigeria

All is not well in the world of legal drug production, offering a cautionary tale for future models of drug regulation. Breaches of Nigerian law have seen big tobacco and big pharma companies in the spotlight . British American Tobacco, and Pfizer in the courts after allegedly causing harm to Nigeria’s people. BA are being tried over a sales strategy that targeted children, whilst Pfizer are in trouble for conducting trials of a vaccine without permission. They both deny the charges.

Asia

Afghanistan

The Guardian claims that a recent parliamentary report puts forward the case that the Blair government is responsible for the failing heroin policy of Afghanistan. The ineffective counter-narcotic strategy has allowed the Taliban to create stronger ties with the narcotics trade. MPs call for a change in approach.

AC Grayling wrote a piece for the Guardian suggesting that recent US proposals to destroy opium crops in Afghanistan is political madness, and he proposes instead that the Government should be buying the opium instead.

Israel

In contrast to the current ‘tough-on-drugs’ rhetoric that is currently consuming UK drug policy, the general inspector of the Israeli Police, has announced that the police will no longer arrest first-time drug users in an effort to refocus drug law enforcement. For more information please follow this link.

Australasia

Australia

Sad news comes to us from the Australian Green Party, who no longer support the legalisation and regulation of illegal drugs. In a bid to gain some of the middle ground of politics they have decided that drugs are best kept prohibited.

4.) What can you do?

Donate

Transform relies solely on donations from individuals and charitable trusts to maintain its work. Ideas, contacts and suggestions are always welcome, and please, if you haven’t already – sign up online to make a donation to the organisation. It really can make a difference. You can do this easily and quickly through our secure online giving page run by the Charities Aid Foundation.

Internet Activity

Most of the national newspapers now have online comments forums where you can respond to articles with what you think. Please get involved with one of these active debates and help tip the balance of opinion. Transform are also compiling a list of blogs and discussion forums relating to drug policy that we will be circulating to volunteers and encouraging people to actively engage in the online debate. More details next month….

Recruitment

Research Associate

We are currently advertising for a Research Associate to join our team. This is an interesting part time post, which will involve carrying out research on drug policy and disseminating information on behalf of Transform. For further information about the post, and how to apply, please either follow the link above or look on our website. Please note the closing date for applications is Tuesday October 16th and interviews will be taking place on 30th October.

Database Administrator

We are also advertising for a temporary worker to help with the maintenance of our new contact database. We are ideally looking for someone who pays great attention to detail and who is available at least two days per week to work in our office. For more information about this post please email jane@tdpf.org.uk or call 0117 941 5810.

Volunteers

Volunteers play a major role in Transform’s work. We currently have volunteers helping us with research, web-design, contributing to the blog, and assisting with our submission to the drug strategy consultation. We would like to thank all the people who have offered their assistance last month. We would particularly like to thank our volunteer Ben Campion who has just left Transform to return to college. We would like to wish him all the best and thank him for all his hard work.

We are currently trying to recruit a volunteer to help with our fundraising. Ideally the person would be available to work at our Bristol office, but some work could be undertaken from home. The volunteer would be working with our Business Manager, John Moore. It would be a great opportunity for anyone who wants to gain experience working in this field. We know there is a lot of potential funding out there, if you think you can help us get it we would like to hear from you. If you’re interested in this position please email john@tdpf.org.uk, or call (0117) 941 5810 for more information.