Time to wise up about drugs, says Sir Richard Branson

The Virgin founder will today declare the war on drugs has failed, urging Australia to return to its pioneering role in drug treatment.

Virgin Group founder Richard Branson will today declare the war on drugs has failed, urging Australia to return to its pioneering role in drug treatment that began with the medically supervised injecting centre in Sydney’s Kings Cross.

The billionaire who founded the Virgin Group will address the Uniting Fair Treatment campaign at Sydney’s Town Hall today as the federal government signals it will push harder on an illicit drug crackdown.

“We live in a drug-taking world. We cannot change that, and we need to be sensible and pragmatic about how we respond,” Sir Richard writes in The Australian today.

“Good policy protects people. Our current drug policies protect no one — neither those who use ­illicit drugs nor the rest of us. In 2001, in the wake of a heroin epidemic that was ravaging the country, Portugal wondered if there was a better way. It removed criminal penalties for the personal possession of small quantities of ­illicit drugs and instead diverted the funding into treatment and education programs.

“Fearmongers predicted an apocalypse. Surely if personal drug possession were decriminalised our children would be permanently stoned, crime would ­increase and chaos would ensue. In fact the opposite happened.”

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton told the National Press Club on Wednesday decriminalisation was “wrong” and declared some US states that legalised cannabis “made the wrong decision”.

But Sir Richard said Australia had pioneered in the area before and should do so again.

“In the same year as the Portuguese reform, Australia was also pioneering in the context of global drug policy,” he said, referring to the Uniting Medically Supervised Injecting Centre.