With new research suggesting the 45-year 'war on drugs' has failed, the question for many now is how to end it without making things worse.
Associate Health Minister Peter Dunne says he wants to treat drug use as a health issue -- rather than criminal -- but still won't consider decriminalising substances at the softer end of the scale, like cannabis.
Massey University senior drug researcher Chris Wilkins says Mr Dunne is on the right track, but the Government's overall policy direction is a bit inconsistent.
"We're in kind of a schizophrenic situation where we're leading the world with legal highs, but with cannabis we're very conservative."
Dr Wilkins says with a growing number of countries and states in the US loosening their drug laws, change here may soon be politically acceptable in the mainstream. The fear he has is going from one extreme -- prohibition -- to the other.
"We don't want to get to that policy window and suddenly everyone says, 'Prohibition has failed, let's go straight to this commercial market,'" says Dr Wilkins.
"There's more options than just prohibition and a commercial, profit-driven market like we have for tobacco and alcohol. We know that tobacco and alcohol model has a lot of problems."
Instead, Dr Wilkins says the Government could:
"We don't want a commercial, profit-driven market where there's advertising, promotion and normalisation."
Police officers who have to deal with the gang and criminal elements of the drug trade say society would probably be better off if cannabis was legalised, as long as we avoid the Netherlands model -- where use is allowed, but criminals still do the selling.
"You get the worst of both worlds, where you get all the increased use but you don't decrease the damage to society," Police Association President Greg O'Connor told Radio New Zealand.
"Whereas if you look at Colorado, they have made conscious attempts in legalising the whole process, from seed to weed."
Mr O'Connor says going down this route will lead to increased cannabis use, but society would be better off overall.
Dr Wilkins agrees, saying Kiwis might stop using and abusing more destructive drugs -- such as alcohol -- in favour of cannabis.
Criminal lawyer Kelly Ellis says a lot of her business "relates to poor people who have been busted for drugs", but wants prohibition to end.
"The war on drugs has been lost. It was started by Richard Nixon -- he's pushing daisies, and so is Ronald Reagan and so is his wife. The reality is that anybody who's pushing this war on drugs is a loser. Read my lips: prohibition doesn't work."
She says fears that legalisation or decriminalisation will "open the floodgates" on drug use are unfounded.
"The reality is that you could go and buy a joint now if you wanted to, and so could I," she said on the Paul Henry programme this morning.
"Why aren't we smoking a big spliff here now? It's because of education -- it's not to do with a lack of availability."
Fellow lawyer and former Green Party leadership candidate Vernon Tava agrees, saying the Government's policy on drug use makes no difference to whether people use them or not.
"People are going to do what they're going to do, and it makes total sense to me -- and now there's a lot of evidence backing this up -- that we need to take a health perspective rather than a criminality, punitive approach."
And for softer drugs like cannabis, legalisation could be the answer to regional economic woes.
"We're missing out on an enormous possible base of tax revenue," says Mr Tava.
"If there's one thing that could boost the economy of Northland, there's it. Ultimately, you've got a thing that people are doing anyway, why not regulate it?"
Without the revenue stream cannabis provides, some say gangs and dealers would turn to harder drugs.
Ms Ellis says that is already happening, especially with this year's cannabis crop shortage, while Mr Tava believes prohibition just encourages criminals to seek bang for their buck by making their products more potent -- and more dangerous.
Newshub.
