Tougher stance on club drug

Michael Gafoor, director of the Alcohol and Drugs Service

NIGHT clubbers in Jersey are substituting ecstasy by snorting plant food.
Mephedrone, which is also known as ‘miaow’, has already been made illegal in the Island, but the situation is getting so serious that the authorities are meeting this month to discuss upgrading it to a class B drug.
The drug is still legal in the UK, but there are moves in Guernsey to reclassify the substance as class A after it was revealed that a third of that island’s prisoners are addicted to it.
Jersey was the first to outlaw mephedrone and now other jurisdictions are looking to follow the Island’s lead.
Here it is placed in the lowest drug category, class C. But Michael Gafoor, director of the Alcohol and Drugs Service, yesterday told the JEP that they are thinking of upgrading it to class B. (from BBC)

Jersey is very arrogant to classify these substances before the UK does! But they seem to be making a name for themselves internationally recently with the legal high issue!

I hope they are proud of themselves criminalising formerly law abiding citizens!

Is it really arrogance to make a decision for the benefit of the Island before the UK makes a decision.

Yes, in my opinion it is! Jersey has always sensibly let the UK lead the way when it comes to Drug Classification (the downgrading of Cannabis aside) until recently. Is seems quite obvious that Jersey is using the issue to repair the damage to the island's international reputation in the wake of the child abuse scandal. By saying they are leading the way in criminalising legal highs they are scoring a lot of political points with countries that maintain a prohibitionist stance.

Saying that they know better than the UK is arrogant when you consider that the ACMD in the UK who give the UK government guidance on drug classification, consist of some of the eminent scientists, doctors and law enforcement minds in the UK. On an island of 90,000 people Jersey advisors cannot compare themselves to the UK, and thus yes i do see it as very arrogant.

Also, in Jersey classifying legal highs before the UK, it is leaving the position where the substance is banned here, but still widely available from UK websites. How many other things would you be breaking the law buying from UK websites?

The situation leads to Jersey legal high users unwittingly breaking the law.

There was absolutely no mention in any of the islands media that Mephedrone, Methylone and Butylone had been made illegal last November until i saw it mentioned briefly in the JEP a few weeks ago, which i'm sure has led to a lot of people still ordering from UK websites with no idea they could get in a lot of trouble if caught.

Aside from this, although none of us want drugs to end up in the hands of children, the Government should have no interest in what adults decide to put into their bodies.

The end result is that legal highs get more dangerous and many users return to using illegal drugs putting money into the hands of dealers and organised crime.