Brendan Griffin calls on Varadkar to head up cross-governmental cocaine strategy

Brendan Griffin said he had "many very, very difficult phone calls from heartbroken parents, spouses, siblings of people who have fallen into addiction, who have fallen on the wrong side of drug dealers, encountered major debts,” File picture: Julien Behal/PA

Kerry TD Brendan Griffin has called on Taoiseach Leo Varadkar to head up a cross-departmental strategy to deal with an increase in cocaine use across the country.

Speaking in the Dáil this afternoon, the Fine Gael TD said that there is a “normalisation” of cocaine use across the country which is leading to suffering.

Mr Griffin said that after raising the matter in the Dáil last week, he received “many very difficult phone calls” from relatives and loved ones of people who fell into drug addiction.

“The reaction I got over the weekend was something I didn’t expect… Many very, very difficult phone calls from heartbroken parents, spouses, siblings of people who have fallen into addiction, who have fallen on the wrong side of drug dealers, encountered major debts,” Mr Griffin said.

“It’s that normalisation, I think, that is the problem we really need to face up to and address.” 

He added that the ongoing operation off the coast of Wexford, which is suspected of smuggling millions of euros worth of cocaine, could “illustrate just how prevalent this problem is”.

“What I’m asking you Taoiseach, will you take personal responsibility for fronting up an effort from government, across all departments, to try to address this problem, because it is literally destroying thousands and thousands of lives and destroying the very fabric of our communities around the country,” Mr Griffin said.

In response, Mr Varadkar said that there is a cross-governmental effort to deal with changes in drug use, led by drugs minister Hildegarde Naughton.

“It is a cross-government effort, and we are taking action, both in terms of increasing services around addiction, which is really important because drug use has changed and people are taking different substances that wouldn’t have been the case in the past and poly-drug use is a much bigger issue as well,” Mr Varadkar said.

“I think we will see that there is a very strong response from the Gardaí and from our Naval Service and others which we can see evident off Wexford today.”