Roundtable on Drug Control
Notes For Presentation of Hon. David Kilgour,
M.P. Edmonton Southeast
Secretary Of State (Latin America and Africa),
To the Parliamentarians Assessment Roundtable
Panel, International Drug Control Summit
2000,
Room 2200, Rayburn House Office Building,
Washington, DC, Tuesday, February 8, 2000
Fellow Legislators,
In the past
year, I have had the opportunity to visit
a number of counties in the Caribbean, Central
and South America and Africa as part of
my duties as Secretary of State. I have
seen the impact of substance abuse. One
of the most compelling scenes was children
on the streets of Tegucigalpa, Honduras,
high on a glue commonly used in making shoes.
It may be good for shoemakers but sold as
it is on the street in baby food jars, it
does serious brain damage to children.
My travels
also took me to Africa where there is a
growing drug abuse and trafficking problem
in some countries about which we in North
America do not always hear.
When I returned
to my constituency in Edmonton, Alberta,
however, and met constituents, they also
told me their concerns about the availability
of drugs in their children’s school,
the impact the trade is having on inner
city areas and the often brutal criminality
that the trade was breeding. These experiences
reinforced for me that the drug problem
affects us all. We as law-makers know this.
Fortunately,
the international community has made some
progress: we have left behind the time when
we attempted to deal with the problem individually
or to deal with it by shifting the blame
to another country. The UN General Assembly
Special Session in June 1998 marked a pivotal
change in how we work together. Increasingly,
we are dealing with the problem as it presents
itself, as a complex multifaceted major
threat to individuals, societies and governments.
Multifaceted
Problem
The range of issues that the participants
to this meeting will be considering reflects
the balanced approach to the drug problem
that the international community is now
pursuing. The threat posed by illicit drugs
will not be reduced with simplistic solutions
that purport to be the only solution. We
must have balance and address both demand
and supply. We have seen some success in
developing effective responses recently,
but the challenge remains staggering.
In the last
national survey conducted, the health, social,
and economic costs of alcohol and illicit
drugs to Canadian society was estimated
to be $Cdn. 8.9 billion attributable to
direct losses in the workforce, administrative
costs, prevention and research, law enforcement,
and health care. The largest was lost productivity
due to illness and premature death.
The overall
rate of drug offences in Canada has increased
since 1993, but the long-term trend generally
remained stable over the past 15 years.
Rates of cocaine offences peaked in 1989,
but has dropped by a third since then. The
rate for heroin offences also increased
for a number of years, peaking in 1993,
but has fallen by one quarter over the last
four years. Most criminal offences involve
cannabis and the rate for such offences
has increased by 34% since 1991.
HIV/AIDS/Hep
C
The serious situation in several Canadian
cities concerning injection drug use, including
high rates of overdose, HIV/AIDS, and Hepatitis
C, is of deep concern. There are approximately
50,000 to 100,000 injection drug users in
Canada. It is estimated that half of the
3,000 to 5,000 new cases of HIV in 1996
were due to injection drug use. Of the newly-identified
Hepatitis C infections, an estimated 80%
to 90% are related to injection drug use.
Particularly
disturbing is the situation in Vancouver
where deaths from overdose are extremely
high, evidently now in the order of one
per day.
Rates and
patterns of drug use among youth are a concern,
particularly with respect to illicit drug
use and binge drinking. Rates of cannabis,
cocaine, and chemical drugs use doubled
between 1993 and 1995, and then levelled
off between 1995 and 1997 although frequency
of cannabis use among youth has been on
an upward trend since 1989. However, current
use of alcohol and cannabis are still below
1979 levels.
Marijuana
Marijuana remains the illegal drug of choice.
Hydroponically grown Canadian marijuana
has become widely used both within Canada
and the United States. Although the RCMP
is making progress in dealing with these
growers, the numbers continue to increase.
We share
with other countries the growing problem
of chemical drugs, especially "ecstasy."
The coroner of the Province of Ontario has
ordered an inquest into the recent death
of a young man which will likely be an examination
of the drug culture found in rave dance.
Several people have died from ecstasy related
complications in the past year in Ontario
alone.
To respond
to the challenges, Canada continues to strongly
support maintaining a balanced approach
to the problem. We do not favour throwing
up our hands and legalising these drugs;
nor do we favour demonizing users. Prevention
is the most cost-effective approach, and
we place a strong emphasis on treatment
and rehabilitation.
Balanced
Approach
We are seeking to integrate the health and
enforcement approaches. Law enforcement
agents are often the first point of contact
with people who abuse drugs. These police
officers increasingly see themselves not
simply as enforcers, but as problem solvers
required to take a public health and educational
approach. An arrest is often the first step
in getting a drug user into a treatment
program.
Our efforts
to deal with the problem domestically are
intricately tied to our participation in
international initiatives. We remain strong
supporters of the UN in its drug control
efforts and were pleased to increase the
resources we have been able to devote the
UNDCP this year.
Canada will
host the General Assembly of the Organisation
of American States in Windsor this summer
and the Third Summit of the Americas in
Quebec City in 2001. At both these events,
the issue of drugs will play an important
role in the agenda.
In the past
year, my colleague the Minister of Foreign
Affairs, Lloyd Axworthy, initiated a dialogue
among foreign ministers in the hemisphere
which was based on Canada’s view that
this a problem which must be treated as
a "human security" problem. Human
security posits that the threats we face
in a post-Cold War world are threats to
the physical safety of individuals –
not to the sector of the state. One of the
things we discovered from the dialogue was
that in terms of dealing with the drug problem,
our hemisphere understands the human security
approach. In the development of the Multilateral
Evaluation Mechanism, in which Canada was
proud to play a role, the affect on the
individual of the drug problem, and of the
policies to counter it, were prominent.
Canadian
Drug Strategy
In 1987 Canada developed it first national
drug strategy, focussing on public awareness
and education, enhanced treatment and rehabilitation,
energized enforcement and control, coordinated
national efforts, and cooperation with international
organizations to promote a balanced approach
to the global drug problem. In a subsequent
program, Canada focussed on those whose
specific needs had not been adequately addressed
such as youth, women, seniors, and Aboriginal
peoples.
The long-term
goal of Canada’s Drug Strategy is to
reduce the harm associated with alcohol
and other drugs to individuals, families
and communities. Seven strategic components
form the foundation of the strategy: research/knowledge
development; knowledge dissemination; prevention
programming; treatment and rehabilitation;
legislation, enforcement and control; national
cooperation; and international cooperation.
The federal government works with a variety
of partners, including provincial/territorial
governments, non-governmental organizations,
community groups, the private sector, health
professional organizations, law enforcement
agencies, and target populations.
Communications
Our experience has been that the struggle
to deal with the drug problem is in many
respects a communications issue. People
have to know the implications of the abuse
of illicit drugs. Perhaps, as one commentator
recently noted, it has been too long since
the public called for action to be taken
to deal with a burgeoning opium addiction
problem for us to fully realize the potential
damage these drugs can do to our citizens
and our societies.
Public information
campaigns are important parts of all of
our strategies. I believe they are key.
Public advocacy is also crucial to build
the constituencies we as law-makers require
to help us spread the message. Our governments
are able to develop laws and policies and
to direct government agencies to do this
and that but without a society that not
only adheres to the law but understands
and supports it, our efforts will be nought.
In 1991 the
XIV World Conference of Therapeutic Communities:
"Drugs and Society to the Year 2000"
conference took place in Montreal. Peter
Vamos, the conference chairman, in his opening
remarks expressed an opinion that I believe
continues to be relevant to the task we
face. He said:
"As
long as the wars on drugs are declared by
politicians and are fought only by bureaucrats,
the police and the professional communities,
the results are doomed. But if the whole
population of each nation is mobilized by
its leadership, by focussing attention on
the real issues and giving the problem its
due priority, then we collectively can shrug
off the terrible yoke of a drug-infested
society."
I will leave
you with those words.
Thank you.
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