Report fails to address root causes of drugs problem

"THE problem of heroin abuse represents not only the most pressing issue confronting the health service and other relevant agencies, but a crisis for the communities concerned and for Irish society as a whole."

This statement is repeated a few times, word for word, in the "First Report of the Ministerial Task Force On Measures to Reduce the Demand for Drugs". And, as one has come to suspect, the repetition of such blather is a cover for yet another pathetic little report on a problem that deserves at the very least a serious analysis.

One might be entitled to expect little else from a random clutch of junior ministers but surely with the likes of Pat Rabbitte and Liz McManus on board, something a little more substantial could have been expected? At the very least, one would have thought these two would have confronted the most striking element of the drugs phenomenon, which the report clearly identifies.

In the first paragraph of a chapter headed "Underlying causes of drug misuse", it is stated: "There is a high correlation between the areas where the problem (of drug abuse) is most acute and the areas which have been designated on the basis of objective criteria as economically and socially disadvantaged under the Operational Programme for Local Urban and Rural Development 1994-1999."

The next paragraph notes that the statutory and voluntary agencies in their submissions to the task force were unanimously of the view that "drug misuse is closely associated with social and economic disadvantage, characterised by unemployment, poor living conditions, low educational attainment, high levels of family breakdown and a lack of recreational facilities and other supports".

This isn't exactly a revolutionary insight for it has been pretty obvious to anybody for a long time who gave the drugs problem even the most fleeting reflection. But it is welcome nonetheless that a ministerial task force would acknowledge this reality and that this was the unanimous view of all the statutory and voluntary agencies who made submissions.

YOU MIGHT have thought that a necessary progression from this acknowledgement would be to propose how the conditions that give rise to the problem under examination could be alleviated. But not a bit of it. Throughout the 92 padded pages of this little report, there isn't a single mention of how the economic and social deprivation, which the report acknowledges is so closely linked to drug abuse, should be changed.

There are two lovely coloured maps of Dublin city and of south Dublin attached to the report. These show the areas of Dublin where those who are receiving treatment for drug-abuse live. The report reasonably concludes that these areas are likely to be the same areas of most drug abuse.

It shows that the worst area is Dublin inner city, followed by Cherry Orchard in west Dublin, then Usher's Quay, the North Dock and Ballymun. Thereafter, Ballyfermot, Drumfinn, Coolock, Ballybough, Clondalkin, Tallaght, Jobstown, Killinarden. In other words, all the deprived areas of Dublin. Ballsbridge, Donnybrook, Blackrock, Dalkey, Killiney, Raheny, Malahide, Howth, Castleknock don't feature at all. Not that there isn't some drug abuse there, but it is nowhere near the problem it is in the deprived areas.

Wouldn't most of us, if confronted with the bleakness of deprivation no job, no prospect of a job, no money, no recreational outlets, no cultural or intellectual interests, no influence, no power, no life - opt to get a little solace through drugs or whatever we could get our hands on?

But politically there is a problem with this. Were the drugs issue to be confronted head on, the issue of deprivation and inequality would have to be addressed. And if there is one thing upon which there is now a unanimous political consensus, it is that inequality shall remain unaddressed actually there is a political consensus about almost everything else as well.

In his introduction to the report, Pat Rabbitte, the chairman of the Task Force, wrote: "Life in these estates (where the drug problem is most acute) has become `nasty, brutish and short'. This cannot continue." Aside from the misapplication of the quotation from The Leviarhan by Thomas Hobbes, the first sentence of this comment is obviously true. All the more surprising then that the report entirely ignores what is perceived to be the determining factor in drug abuse.

Pat Rabbitte's contention in the second sentence that such conditions "cannot continue" is just humbug. They can and will and he knows it. HERE are deep rigidities in Irish society, which help to confine the poor in poverty, irrespective of what happens elsewhere and irrespective of how "tigerish" is the Irish economy. This is illustrated by the durability of long-term unemployment over a period when the economy has been experiencing phenomenal economic growth. It is also illustrated by the concentration of visible economic and social misery in many working-class areas of Dublin, notably the inner city, some west county suburbs, Finglas and Ballymun in the north of the city and areas in Tallaght in the south.

There simply is no political will to pour resources into those areas to break the vice grip of deprivation. What would the £200 million that is being squandered in the Luas madcap scheme do for those areas - even if you think that the Luas scheme is not madcap why should the management of Dublin traffic take precedence over the basic interests of so many Dubliners?

Just think of what the £16 million capital expended on Teilifis na Gaeilge and the millions it will cost annually do for these areas - that alone would provide the treatment centres urgently required to deal with the drugs problem. Many are deeply resentful about any conjunction being made between such objectives but, given scarce resources, such conjunctions are always there.

But this only touches the surface of official cynicism over the drugs phenomenon. The scandal of the neglect of elementary treatment facilities over more than a decade is another facet of such cynicism. The elucidation of that has to await another day.