McDowell agrees with cautioning cannabis users

JUSTICE Minister Michael McDowell said yesterday it may make sense to caution cannabis users rather than prosecute them, but warned that it was still a criminal offence.

Mr McDowell was commenting after being briefed by Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy on a new adult cautioning scheme for minor offences.

But the minister warned cannabis users they could still be charged and that they were supporting drug lords by buying cannabis.

“Myself and the commissioner have had an opportunity to discuss this and he and I both want to emphasis that there’s no question of the law being changed, that it remains a criminal offence to use cannabis in any circumstance,” he said.

“It also remains a criminal offence which is prosecutable when the guards decide to prosecute it.”

The Adult Cautioning Scheme, due to begin on February 1, follows consultations between the gardaí and the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).

The DPP advised that a list of scheduled offences could now be considered as “cautionable”, meaning the offender could be formally cautioned instead of being charged before the courts and prosecuted.

The list of offences, yet to be finalised, includes public order offences, alcohol-related offences, some theft crimes, minor assault as well as possession of cannabis for personal use.

Mr McDowell said there was “no question” of the gardaí or the DPP depriving themselves of the discretion to prosecute for these offences.

“But in many cases it may make sense, instead of queuing up for a court time in three or six months time, to confront an offender who accepts his or her responsibility with the facts now, to bring them before a senior officer of An Garda Síochána to administer a caution and to draw to their attention that they are committing a very serious offence,” said the minister.

He said the Adult Cautioning Scheme had its genesis in the Nally Report, published in the early 1990s. He said under the existing Misuse of Drugs legislation, penalties for cannabis possession for personal use were lower than for other illegal drugs.

He told cannabis users that anyone who smoked a joint in a social context was participating on the fringe of a world where gangsters were shooting each others’ heads off.

“There is no such thing as victimless consumption of recreational drugs. You can’t say ‘I’m happy to just use cannabis on a personal social basis’ without taking moral responsibility for the fact that you are keeping in being the drugs lords.”

Minister of State with responsibility for the National Drugs Strategy Noel Ahern said: “I restate that the use of cannabis is illegal and that it is my strongly held view, and that of the Government, that it will remain so. Nobody should interpret any lessening of the resolve of the Government in this regard.”

Anna Quigley of the Dublin Citywide Drugs Crisis Campaign said it made sense that people didn’t end up with a criminal record for small amounts of cannabis for personal use.

Independent TD and veteran drugs campaigner Tony Gregory said: “I haven’t seen the scheme, but my general view is that to make any impact, garda resources should be concentrated going after suppliers. You’re wasting your time going after anyone else.”