Corkman who uses cannabis for epilepsy had to lie to daughter when jailed
Corkman Martin Condon, a director of the Patients for Safe Access group, revealed he had been imprisoned in Cork prison on one occasion. Picture: Eddie O'Hare
A man who uses cannabis for epilepsy has told the Oireachtas Justice Committee that he had to lie to his young daughter when jailed because she thought “prison was for bad people”.
Corkman Martin Condon is a director of the Patients for Safe Access group, and told the committee that he has to buy cannabis on the black market.
He was one of a number of witnesses before the committee on Tuesday to discuss the present approach to sanctions for possession of certain amounts of drugs for personal use.
He told the meeting:
"I have a number of criminal convictions for my continued use of cannabis and as a result I was denied a travel visa to the US where I would’ve had the opportunity to represent Cork Institute of Technology as part of the ‘Students for Sensible Drug Policy’ society.
"While there I was to take part in the 2016 United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Drugs in New York city. I was robbed of this opportunity to learn and grow as a campaigner and to network with world leaders on this issue of drug use.”
He revealed he had been imprisoned in Cork prison on one occasion, adding: “I had to lie about where I was to my then five-year-old daughter because at the time she knew prison as a place where ‘bad people’ go.”
He highlighted a case in which a man in West Cork who was self-medicating for chronic pain was prosecuted for possession of €4 of cannabis.
Professor Bobby Smyth, a child and adolescent psychiatrist who specialises in addictions, spoke on behalf of the Cannabis Risk Network.
He said the network is “an informal group of doctors from a wide range of specialities who are concerned about the substantial increases in cannabis-related health harms evident in Ireland over the past 12 years”. He said that as medics, the network strongly supports a health-led approach to cannabis and to wider drug policy.
However, he said: “We recognise that the criminal justice system often plays a role in achievement of positive outcomes in areas of public health including efforts to curtail mortality and injury related to road traffic collisions and most recently during the Covid-19 pandemic. In our view, criminal justice and health are not opponents.”
He continued: “We believe that there is a real risk that a reduction in sanctions could cause use and associated health harms to escalate. The weight of evidence from national and international research indicates that sanctions have a small but important effect. Please bear in mind that small effects across large populations are clinically important.”
He said, however, that the Cannabis Risk Network view the current sanction of imprisonment for personal drug use to be “excessive and unreasonable”.
Senator Lynn Ruane told the committee that “every society in the world pleasure-seeks through drug use”, adding that profits are being made in the criminal justice system because of the criminalisation of drug possession.
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