Dublin Drugs Conference reports by Rita O'Reilly

Dublin drug campaigners remain unconvinced about the Garda approach to drug dealing after sharp exchanges at a drugs conference last weekend. The two-day gathering hosted by Dublin Corporation ended with unanimous backing for a call from City Manager John Fitzgerald for extra state resources to take on the crisis. However, views on how and where Garda resources are being directed were far from unanimous.

Assistant Commissioner Tom King, the man who gave Operation Dóchas its name, was present to give a commitment that on its 75th anniversary, the Garda Síochána wished to renew its vows of service to the community. But the arrest of three more anti-drug activists in Ballybough in the days prior to the Conference gave the Commissioner's words a hollow sound. One of the three, Tony Kelly, has led Ballybough residents' peaceful marches and vigils against a heroin dealer who returned to the area recently under police protection. Last October, the dealer left his partner's flat following sustained community pressure.

TD Tony Gregory said the Assistant Commissioner had ``all the terms'' and ``trendy expressions''. ``You're picking them up from the community and you're integrating them into your speech. It sounds great, but it doesn't filter down''.

The speech, he said, was a PR exercise. Communities were living with the ``total failure'' of the Garda: almost a hundred young people had died while none of the dealers ``who devastated the North Inner City'' have been caught.

Earlier, Tom King came in for sharp criticism during intemperate exchanges with members of the audience. Asked by a SIPTU delegate about remarks of his quoted in the Irish Independent alleging that the drugs movement had been overtaken by subversives, the Assistant Commissioner claimed: ``I was quoted out of context and so on''.

He dismissed questions about the Urlingford drugs operation as ``rubbish'', a comment which landed him in more trouble with a community representative who said she found his answer ``insulting''.

Though King claimed he would know the names of all of ``the small number of anti-drugs activists who engage in criminal actions'', he appeared blissfully unaware of the long-running controversy regarding the Ballybough-based heroin dealer. When Kieran Browning of Hardwicke Street asked why the dealer was driving around with a Garda escort when he had been banned from driving in the courts, Tom King promised he would investigate the matter and said he had only been made aware of it the day before by a City Councillor, Christy Burke.

Councillor Burke said all people wanted was ``to have confidence in the Garda that the people can stop patrolling their areas, that they can go home leaving the Garda to take over.'' The reality, though, was that over the Christmas period the people had taken a break but so too had the Gardaí.

 
• In a workshop asking `Pushing Addicts Out: Is this the Answer?'', speakers Tony Geoghegan of Merchant's Quay Project and Fearghal Connolly of Community Response agreed that there wasn't anybody suggesting this as a solution. But Tony Geoghegan revealed that a survey of addicts last November by Merchant's Quay found 52% claimed they had been threatened and 27% claimed they had been assaulted by anti-drugs protestors. However, several contributors poured cold water on the survey. André Lyder of COCAD said the findings just did not match what was happening on the ground. He pointed out that the same people who were pushing the pushers were also the ones pushing for treatment facilities and help for addicts. Vincent Doherty, a community worker with the Eastern Health Board, called for communities to develop guidelines or a protocol on how to address drug dealing locally, but he warned against an unquestioning approach. ``It's a funny old game,'' Doherty said, ``after all, John Gilligan tells us he never sells or buys drugs...''.

Focus on women addicts

A single sex approach to drug treatment services is very important, said Joan Byrne of SAOL, a pilot project supporting 15 women to rebuild their lives away from drug addiction. ``The women in the SAOL project said they couldn't have achieved what they did if men had been involved too.''

Women drug users in areas like the North Inner City of Dublin live in ``fractured and severely damaged communities'' and have to cope with ``extreme social isolation and disadvantage,'' she said. Poor housing, coping with pregnancy, unemployment, low nutrition, extreme stress, educational disadvantage, domestic abuse, past sexual abuse and poor health services are just some of the issues they face. Women take on the burden of care in their families and communities and a response to them had to be developed at both the individual and community level.

Governor of Mountjoy Prison John Lonergan told a Conference workshop that drug addiction is only a minor part of all the problems daily facing the people who end up in Mountjoy. ``Low self esteem is probably the biggest factor and is very evident in women prisoners.''

``I see all the problems of society, all the ostracisation and hypocrisy and belittling and all the other wrongs manifesting themselves snugly in the Women's Prison in Mountjoy'', he said.

Lonergan said 550 women come into Mountjoy every year, most of them mothers and most unable to cope themselves. ``Again, you have to look at the background: the fact is women in prison in Ireland have been horrifically abused by men, used by men and subjected to huge levels of violence.''

Most syringe attackers not junkies

The majority of syringe attacks are carried out by criminals with no connection with drugs, the Corporation Conference was told. New figures show only 11.47% of people charged with such attacks over a six month period were drug abusers, Garda Assistant Commissioner Tom King revealed.

The findings sharply contradict recent reports blaming `drug-crazed junkies' for the increase in syringe attacks. They confirm concerns reported in An Phoblacht (30 January `97) about forthcoming legislation introducing five-year sentences for carrying a syringe `without lawful authority'. Because most injecting drug users use syringes without lawful authority it is feared that the legislation could affect needle exchange services and disease prevention.

Latest drug services figures show the age of drug abusers presenting themselves for treatment is getting younger and younger. Noel Towe, a Lurgan-born adviser to English local authorities told the Conference a study in England found that by the year 2000 the `deviant' young will be those who have not tried drugs.