Madam, - Gráinne Kenny of the Stupified Driving Committee has called on Gay Byrne to resign as chairman of the Road Safety Authority because he said he was coming round to the view that illegal drugs should be legalised (The Irish Times, February 26th). Mr Byrne feels that attempts to deal with the problem through law enforcement have "demonstrably failed".
Ms Kenny points out that one's driving is affected by smoking cannabis (and presumably by other drug use) and, quite rightly, is concerned with the implications for road safety.
However there are serious implications for road safety not only from drugs such as cannabis but also from alcohol. The logic of Ms Kenny's position is that, because driving is affected by alcohol, we should ban its sale also. Yet the policy of prohibition in the United States led to alcohol being bought and sold illegally with a concomitant rise in criminality, gang wars and murder. Sadly, this is precisely what is happening here with the current policy on illegal drugs.
Mr Byrne, in common with many of us, is thinking about the drugs problem and how it might best be addressed. There is nothing wrong in that.
What is clear is that there is a persistent demand for drugs. So long as there is a demand there is a market and suppliers will profit from it. There is general agreement that cigarette smoking is seriously harmful but society agrees to deal with that odious market by legalising and regulating it. Otherwise it too would be prone to criminal supply and lawlessness.
Illegal drugs pose two huge problems for society. One is demand fuelled by addiction. The other is the criminal mayhem generated by illegal supply. Neither is easily solved. A long-term policy of social development and education will bring some improvement but will probably never completely eradicate the demand for drugs. Our cigarette smoking policy has been quite successful but about a third of the population still smoke.
The problems associated with illegal supply of drugs can be dealt with by legalising their supply, with appropriate controls. This will not be easy, nor can we do it alone - it would be unworkable for Ireland to legalise drugs ahead of the rest of the world. But we should be taking a lead and starting to persuade our partners in the EU to evolve a regime that will face up to the problem realistically. We need more people like Mr Byrne to be honest and open enough to consider making the necessary changes. - Yours, etc,
JACK MORRISSEY,
Acorn Road,
Dublin 16.