Rebuilding Better: Lessons from Portugal on drug reform

OPINION:

Aotearoa New Zealand rightly prides itself on our world-leading achievements. From the guarantee of indigenous representation in Parliament through the Māori seats, to the eight-hour workday, to votes for women, to our nuclear-free policy, to the first transgender MP, we’ve been trailblazers.

But one area where we’ve fallen behind is drug policy. As the world moves forward, we’re stuck with repressive law that’s 50 years out of date, and pursues the failed idea of punishing drug use, rather than treating addiction and minimising harm.

I visited the city of Porto in Portugal recently and the people there are genuinely proud of how they rewrote the script on drug law, and saved lives in the process.

Thirty years ago, they told me, people were dying in the streets of Porto from heroin overdoses. Under the dictatorship of António de Oliveira Salazar, drug repression had been strict – you even needed a licence to own a cigarette lighter. But those strict laws were not suited to the wave of drug imports that hit Portugal as it opened up to the world in the 80s and 90s. One per cent of the population reported being addicted to hard drugs, and hundreds died each year.

I’m writing this article for the Herald’s Rebuilding Better project, which has launched with a focus on the economy.

The drug epidemic affected every part of Portuguese society and required a whole-of-society approach, which we can learn from. They knew change was needed and so they radically upended their laws.

In 2001, all drug possession was decriminalised – with a fine only payable for someone with more than 10 days’ supply. Users got access to healthcare without having to fear legal repercussions. Today, the death toll from drug overdoses in Portugal is less than a quarter of the European average.

Not only has the reform saved lives directly and kept people out of prison, it’s removed a major source of friction between the government and impoverished communities. Criminalisation of drugs creates a shadow economy of drug dealers and gangs, where violence is commonplace, leading in turn to police raids and crackdowns that alienate those communities from the government and wider society. We see that all the time in Aotearoa.

Patients are handed their daily dose of methadone by nurse Joao Matos from a van in Lisbon, Portugal. Photo / Getty Images

In Portugal, drug reform has enabled those communities to have more trust in government, and that reaped rewards through their very high Covid vaccination uptake.

One factor in Portugal’s ability to make reforms was that it was seen as a problem faced by the whole country together.

I was told one of the spurs for change was the death of a conservative politician’s son from an overdose.

Here, drug use is seen as largely a Māori and Pasifika problem and, as a result, some politicians still see votes in a “get tough” message, directed at conservative Pakeha.

Drug deaths in Aotearoa are on the rise, up 54 per cent between 2017 and 2021 when there were 171 deaths – that’s half the number of road deaths, but it is a silent toll.

We can’t go on like this. There’s no need to, when there’s a proven alternative. As Helen Clark has said, “Portugal turned a high death rate around through decriminalisation of use and possession. It’s time New Zealand followed the evidence and did the same.”

Easier for an ex-politician to say than a current politician to do. I fear the failure of the cannabis referendum has set the conversation on drug reform in Aotearoa back a decade. Rather than our accustomed place as world leaders, we now look increasingly like laggards.

Until these antiquated laws are updated, people will continue to die needlessly, and our prisons will be filled with young people on drug offences, or because they have become part of the violence that surrounds an illegal drug trade.

There is a better path, the one Portugal has walked already, and one I hope our Government will have the courage to lead Aotearoa on in the near future.

• Shane Te Pou (Ngai Tuhoe) is a commentator, blogger and former Labour party activist.