Niederlande. MPs, health experts and lawyers call for new approach to drugs

MPs, television celebrities, lawyers, leading lights from the dance scene and health experts are among the 79 people who have signed a new manifesto calling for major reform in official Dutch drugs policy. ‘The need for a new and realistic drugs policy is greater than ever. The international drug trade has taken root in the Netherlands and with serious consequences,’ the online manifesto states. ‘Mayors are receiving death threats, a lawyer was murdered and ecstasy waste dumping is threatening the environment. But the manifest powerlessness in the face of drug-related crime is making for ever greater repression.’ The signatories, including D66 MP Vera Bergkamp, former VVD minister Frits Bolkestein and dance pioneer Duncan Stutterheim, say the aim is to reduce the risk of drugs to health and boost public safety – firstly by tackling the revenue model. ‘A regulated – not a free – drugs market the starting point of a new drugs policy,’ the manifesto states. ‘lllegality fuels crime. That is why we must tackle the revenue model of the criminals and make a regulated- not a free – drug market the starting point of a new drugs policy.’ (DutchNews.nl, Niederlande, 20.01.2020)

https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2020/01/mps-health-experts-and-lawyers-call-for-new-approach-to-drugs/