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Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) UK Conference

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Last month, in my new role as Dir­ector of LEAP Europe, I was invited to do a talk at the SSDP con­fer­ence in Lon­don.  It was great to meet the key SSDP organ­isers, and also share a plat­form with Jason Reed, the co-ordinator of LEAP UK.

The stu­dent act­iv­ists of SSDP are demand­ing that our polit­ical classes instig­ate a mature, fact-based dis­cus­sion about the “war on drugs”.

Sorry to rehash all the well-known art­icles about why this “war” is such a fail­ure on every con­ceiv­able front, but just let me reit­er­ate three key points: pro­hib­i­tion will always fail (as this clas­sic “Yes Min­is­ter” scene depicts), and the reg­u­la­tion and tax­a­tion of recre­ational drugs (in the same way as alco­hol and tobacco) would be good for soci­ety and for the eco­nomy; it would decap­it­ate organ­ised crime and, in some cases, the fund­ing of ter­ror­ism; and it would make the use and pos­sible abuse of recre­ational drugs a health issue rather than a crim­inal matter.

The stu­dents get this — why can’t our politicians?

Jason and I had a warm wel­come from the SSDP. They can see the value of law enforce­ment pro­fes­sion­als — police, judges, law­yers, and cus­toms and intel­li­gence officers — using their exper­i­ence to con­trib­ute to the debate. I look for­ward to LEAP work­ing more closely with the SSDP.

And do drop me an email if you would like to help LEAP in Europe.

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AUTHOR
Annie Machon is a former intelligence officer for MI5, the UK Security Service, who resigned in 1996 to blow the whistle on the spies' incompetence and crimes with her ex-partner, David Shayler. Drawing on her varied experiences, she is now a media pundit, author, journalist, international tour and event organiser, political campaigner, and PR consultant. She has a rare perspective both on the inner workings of governments, intelligence agencies and the media, as well as the wider implications for the need for increased openness and accountability in both public and private sectors. She is also a recognised international public speaker on a variety of issues: security and intelligence, ethics and citizenship, the war on terror, press and media freedoms, secrecy legislation, civil liberties, totalitarianism and police states, accountability in government and business as well as discussing her personal story of being 'on the run'. Annie can also provide relatively pain-free and fun training in public speaking and media skills. Annie read Classics at Cambridge University and then began a career in publishing. In 1991 she was recruited by MI5 where she was posted to their political and counter-terrorism departments.
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2 replies to this post

  1. the reason the anti-drug policies fail is because they are designed to fail. these drugs were made illegal so the jewish mafia could make billions. the stronger the politician’s stance against decriminalisation or legalisation, the more likely they are in the pocket of the jewish mafia. when tel aviv is feeling alturistic, they let the cia or mi6 syphon a bit of spending money off the top so they can fund their terrorism, black ops and false flags.

  2. “The stu­dents get this — why can’t our politicians?”

    Because they are paid 20% of the profits from illegal drug sales by the drug dealers.

    Think about it. 10,000 people elect someone to represent them politically. Those 10,000 people make it clear that they want drugs to be legal.

    The person they elected then votes “No” on legalizing drugs. Why? He knows the 10,000 people who he is supposed to represent want drugs to be legal. He knows there is a good chance he will not be re-elected if he doesn’t vote “Yes” for drug legalization. Yet he still votes “No” on drug legalization.

    People do what is in their own best interest. What could be better than getting re-elected to a job you told the public you wanted?

    How about 20% of the profits from the sale of very profitable illegal drugs?

    If the politician doesn’t get re-elected, who cares? 20% of the profits from the illegal drugs sold to the 10,000 people who elected him is probably millions of dollars.

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