RECENT claims from local Labour Party TD Conor Sheehan that Limerick is the “crack cocaine capital of Ireland” are not helpful, a County Limerick TD hit out in the Dáil.
Rural Ireland Independent TD Richard O’Donoghue took issue with the remark during a private members motion on the decriminalisation of people who use drugs.
The County Limerick politician took the view that people who are addicted to drugs are being punished while dealers go free, before taking aim at Deputy Sheehan’s recent remarks.
“Recently, Deputy Conor Sheehan said that Limerick was the cocaine capital of Ireland. It is not,” Deputy O’Donoghue told the Dáil.
“It is the crack cocaine capital of Ireland,” Deputy Sheehan fired back.
Deputy O’Donoghue vehemently disagreed, telling the Labour TD that “branding Limerick like that is not nice. We are here to help people all the time, and Deputy Sheehan should not say such things. The whole country has a drug problem. Naming one place by itself is not right.”
The Independent TD also took the view that the government should look at the Portuguese model for solutions – that is, the decriminalisation of the possession drugs in amounts deemed to be for personal use.
“Nobody wants to see people with addiction punished while the dealers get rich. In Limerick, Sr Concilio in Cuan Mhuire has done an amazing job trying to help people with addiction. The centre has opened a farm and a garden centre to reintroduce people into the workplace,” he said.
“A former hurler from Limerick, Ciaran Carey, has counselling services doing the same, using people who have suffered from addictions themselves, because they know what they talking about.
“We see people doing all this great work and then we are talking about punishing people who have addictions and we are letting the dealers go free. They go free because they are able to get the drugs into this country, the same way as food can be imported. There is nothing stopping them coming in.”
Deputy O’Donoghue said that Ireland needs to try “something different” in tackling drugs.
“I believe Portugal has tried something slightly different. There, certain drugs have been legalised in a controlled way. Here, it was shown that people who were suffering from serious illnesses could be helped by medicinal cannabis after every other drug had been tried. In some cases, the only thing that actually worked was medicinal cannabis to give that person a quality of life.
“Under tight legislation and under tight laws, I would like to see those people have a quality of life if that is the only quality of life that is there, if the other drugs are not there to help them. We have legalised drugs in this country through our chemists and others, which are prescribed drugs for people.
“If none of them works and the medicinal cannabis does work for people to give them a quality of life, I would be for that, as long as it is legislated for tightly and controlled.
“We should look at the Portuguese model. If we take control away from the dealers, we might actually halve the problem. Something has to be done differently.”