Alternattiva Demokratika Zghazagh (ADZ – Green Youth) has said that it is in favour of the decriminalisation of cannabis for personal and medical use and for rehabilitation for drug users who need help instead of useless prison sentences.

"It is for this reason that it is in disagreement with the fact that former cannabis growers, such as Daniel Holmes, are still behind bars wasting public funds uselessly."

"It is unfair for a person who committed a victimless crime to serve time behind bars," ADZ spokesperson James Gabarretta stated. "Tax payers are funding the incarceration of harmless people, paying for their food and accommodation among other costs. Where necessary it would be more wise to invest the same money on rehabilitation, community work and programmes to reintegrate those who need help to reintegrate into society and the community."

James Gaberretta continued, "ADZ is in favour of the decriminalisation of drugs – that is the act of drug taking both on humanitarian and economic grounds. These two measures have had positive effects in various countries including Uruguay, some states in the U.S.A, The Netherlands, Portugal and Switzerland, in many cases leading to an actual decrease in hard drug use and a decrease in crime rates associated with the drug trade."

He added, "it is well known that drug trafficking involves cartels often linked to other crimes such as human trafficking. A reduction in the demand for hard drugs will put these unscrupulous people out of trade and make it easier for abusers to seek help. The Portuguese model of drug decriminalisation has led to a decrease in hard drug use and drug related crime; it provides more than ample justification to move towards a more humane drug policy which actually decreases the use of hard drugs and stops the waste of public resources on people who do no harm to others."

"Putting everyone in the same basket and treating all drugs the same, mixing up traffickers with drug abusers or abusers sharing substances is short sighted. At least Malta has a long standing policy of 'no-questions-asked' distribution of clean syringes, which has prevented serious diseases – we want to go a step further and treat drug abuse – especially of hard drugs with very serious health effects on abusers – as a medical and social problem instead of as a criminal justice problem."

ADZ Chairperson, Marc Andrea Cassar stated that, "drug safety can be more closely monitored, and preventing additional serious health problems and overdoses associated with amphetamines and opiates is drug users are not afraid of being cornered into admitting to trafficking charges for drug sharing – we have all heard of people being abandoned by other victims of drug abuse out of fear of prosecution."

Cassar concluded, "regarding cannabis, it is time to accept that alcohol is as much as a drug as is cannabis, and that we cannot incarcerate people who consume or grow their own cannabis for their own personal use and completely ignore the vast problems with alcohol consumption which prevail amongst many strata of society. Despite promises by Labour, the so called reforms in drug laws have hardly changed anything."

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