Decriminalization Disaster
You know something has gone horribly wrong when the NDP admits one of their so called “progressive” policies has failed.
That said, to his credit, over the weekend, BC’s NDP premier David Eby did just that.
David Eby’s NDP has now admitted that Justin Trudeau’s decriminalization of hard drugs experiment has failed, leaving ruined lives in its wake, and asked the PM to scale back significant elements of their drug decriminalization program. According to the federal Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, the Liberals have no intention of doing so.
Ottawa allowed BC to decriminalize small amounts of hard drugs like heroin and fentanyl starting in January 2023, saying it was a way to “destigmatize” drug use and address the overdose crisis.
Since then, the Liberals have flooded the streets with dangerous opioids (as well as heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine) and ruined the lives of countless Canadians and their families.
The Liberal-NDP view was, (and remains), it is more important to remove the “stigma” of drug use than to bring healing and recovery from addiction.
To that end, since 2017, they have spent over $800 million taxpayer dollars on this failed strategy, including $100 million in direct funding for hard drugs.
The Trudeau Government plans to spend an additional $74 million to “scale up” this failed program.
Since Trudeau formed government 42,000 Canadian have died of drug overdoses, with the annual number of overdose deaths more than doubling.
British Columbia (which has been ground zero for this failed program) alone has seen an increase of 380% in overdose deaths.
On top of this, it is increasingly clear that these taxpayer-funded drugs continue to be diverted and sold on the street. Multiple police drug busts have shown the so called “safe supply” drugs have ended up in the hands of organized crime. In many cases, addicts will, themselves, take the “safe-supply” taxpayer-funded drugs and sell them to kids, then use the proceeds to pay for street drugs.
In fact, it’s so easy to get these drugs, a Global News reporter in East Vancouver was able to buy 26 hits of a dangerous highly addictive taxpayer-funded opioid for a mere $30, within 30 minutes. Last year’s federal budget even included money for vending machines where you can buy heroin.
It’s madness.
Instead of listening to the experts, Justin Trudeau has a theory, based on his radical ideology, and backed by a group of equally radical activists—most of them representing big pharma (who gave us the opioid crisis) and other “progressive” special interests who stand to gain by perpetuating this crisis.
Despite the carnage in BC, the City of Toronto (also under an NDP mayor) now wants to bring this failed program to Canada’s largest city.
On Monday, common sense Conservatives called for an emergency debate on Justin Trudeau’s increasingly reckless decriminalization policy.
Conservatives (and only Conservatives) are listening to the experts.
We are listening to the families of the victims.
We recognize opioid addiction is a health issue.
Drug companies lied about the highly addictive nature of these drugs. Big pharma must be held financially accountable for the chaos and deaths they
have caused. Rather than give them more money like Justin Trudeau and the NDP, Conservatives will spend that money to help those suffering from addiction to recover.
Conservatives are calling for a complete end to the Trudeau-NDP’s deadly failed experiment of decriminalization and taxpayer-funded hard drugs.
We will restore hope for the most vulnerable Canadians suffering from drug addiction and their families by investing in treatment and recovery.
We will end the chaos in our communities and bring our loved-ones home drug free.