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Drugs

Banderton: Putting the P in BZP

"Bad lessons always have to be learned anew," says Dr. Richard Goode, Libertarianz Drugs Spokesman. "And we're about to learn a bad lesson - that prohibition doesn't work - yet again."

"When alcohol was banned in the United States in the 1930s," he recounts, "organised crime stepped into the breach to meet the ongoing demand. With the impending ban on BZP-based party pills, exactly the same thing is set to happen here."

"The word on the street is that criminal gangs have been stockpiling BZP in anticipation. They have developed their own range of party pills to supply the market immediately the ban comes into effect. But the new pills also contain unlabelled ingredients not found in today's legal highs, such as methamphetamine, a drug which produces a euphoric high 20 times more intense than BZP." Goode continues, "The same thing happened in the US in the 1930s. During the prohibition years, moonshine eclipsed beer. Prohibition encourages dealers to produce and provide a stronger, more harmful product. This phenomenon is so well recognised that it even has a name: the Iron Law of Prohibition."

"Jim Banderton is not mistaken in believing that drug abuse is a scourge that is devastating our society. His mistake is failing to recognize that the very measure he favours - prohibition - is a major source of the evils he deplores."

"New Zealand has been put on stand-by for a dangerous increase in drug-related crime. But the unintended consequences of Banderton's proposed BZP ban will go far beyond this. Nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be enforced."

"It's enough to make you vote Libertarianz!"

ENDS

www.libertarianz.org.nz

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