How much would Cocaine cost if it was fully legal ?

Three fiddy!

Excise duty will triple the the price.

They will go to something else. But drugs have massive profits. Remove their income streams and they won't be as powerful.

We've already seen what happens when there's a legal alternative, when the head shops were legal no body went to the dealers. What's better for society a shop paying rent and taxes selling quality controlled drugs with age verification or the current situation were criminals are making a fortune selling who knows what to anyone who wants drugs?

People OD because of the drugs being illegal as they never know how pure it is or what it's cut with. We are trying to set up safe injection centres with medical professionals in case of OD, why not give them safe drugs instead? Being illegal doesn't stop people getting off their head, being legal takes a lot of the risk out of consuming drugs.

Addiction is a different problem, not everyone who takes drugs is addictied just like not everyone who drinks is an alcoholic, and we need to have proper facilities for the treatment of all addictions. Drink, gambling and drug addiction destroys people and families.

It's an interesting question about legalising drugs, and given the (I don't want to say complete, but quite bad) failure to win the war on drugs, I would say that it would be a positive step. The big problem would be that there is still such a stigma on drug use and drug addiction that there would be big political capital to be gained in being the party to step forward and ban them again. It will be a major talking point that the state is aiding the ruination of lives by legalising drugs and allowing them to be sold. The counter will be that alcohol and tobacco are already illegal, and the counter to that will be that two evils are bad enough and why legalise more. I can already hear the endless Liveline debates in my head...

The other thing would be that because cocaine will still be seen as a bad thing to take, recreationally, and can cause addiction issues, it will likely be controlled so tightly and perhaps taxed out the arse, that it may still be cheaper and more convenient to just go to black market dealers, so there would have been not much solved at all.

So, decriminalising drugs for small amounts possessed, absolutely. Legalising their sale is good in theory to take the power out of gangs' hands, but the question of that becoming a moral and political football would need to be solved as well, and there would need to be a huge effort put into addiction treatment and destigmatising that.

Legalising won't work. Government would set the price at a point they believe would limit its use but completely ignore the fact that the illegal route could supply it cheaper.

There would be other issues though.

My life has been more touched by the individual side than the gangland side.

Regular cocaine users can be absolute nightmares, arrogant and narcissistic. My ex does cocaine and if it was legalised I would be very concerned that it would be considered ok for him to be doing coke and having a session when he had the kids!

@Del2005

Weren't the head shops legal during the recession? No one could even afford coke then and everyone I know had given up, even the serious addicts were forced to give up even though previously the massive debts and death threats didn't make them stop 😅 then the head shops arrived later and people could start to get high again because it was cheap, it wasn't really a case of people having the choice but switching.

Also you said people are OD'ing because of what it's cut with etc. but that's not really the case with cocaine. Maybe it has happened but generally it's cocaine that's the issue, specifically cocaine mixed with alcohol which actually creates a more lethal substance in the body, and affects the heart etc.

How can they make that safe if it's the cocaine itself (and alcohol) which is causing the problems?

So because “lots of people take cocaine” it needs to be legalised .

Hmmm ok- let’s then simply apply that logic to pretty much everything currently illegal - “if lots of people do it then legalise it”

It's to reduce the amount of scumbags on the streets. Imagine what the streets would be like if all the degenerate alcoholics didn't have somewhere to go.

The war on drugs is causing more suffering than legalising them would and treating addictions. We've failed countries in Central/South America and parts of Asia where people are killed because cartels are fighting to control the drug trade and people are slaves to some of the cartels. Legalizing it would remove the power of the cartels so countries could rebuild if they aren't fighting a lost war.

The vast majority of people who take drugs legal or illegal don't get addicted. Taking drugs at the weekend isn't addiction, taking drugs to go to work is. The only reason why there's social stigma is because they are illegal. We've bigger social issues with burying our heads in the sand with addictions, how many young people are addicted to gambling yet nothing is done about that. Any addiction is bad not just illegal drugs.

How many billions of Euro are spent on the war on drugs instead of on addiction treatments. A Black Hawk would pay for the treatment of lots of addicts. There's multiple naval vessels doing drug interdictions all over the world yet they only get 10% at best, how many treatment facilities for addicts could we get instead of sending ships out to let 90% through.

Decimalising drugs still keeps the cartels and dealers in business, legalising it will drive most of them out of business.

Dugs don't make people nightmares, arrogant, narcissists or violent. Drugs just remove the veils people put up and shows who/what they really are.

Coke was always popular, it's just gotten a lot more open recently. But when the head shops where open no one was buying coke, speed, pills or weed from the dealers. Coke is only part of the problem, people are openly taking heroin and crack on the streets of Dublin and they are what's causing the ODs. We can't make drugs safe, have you seen how much damage alcohol does / cars are extremely dangerous / a lot of household chemicals are lethal , we just have to manage them. People have been getting off their heads since we discovered mind altering substances, making them illegal never worked.