Madam President, I should like firstly to congratulate the rapporteur, Mrs Malliori, who, as do other rapporteurs in the case of all the reports we prepare, relies on the opinions of the other groups with a view to obtaining a final outcome that we can all accept. It seems that, in this case, there are some differences of opinion, but I believe that it will be possible for the report to be approved by a majority of this Parliament. The report and the Commission communication refer to the prevention and reduction of risks. Every Member will express his or her opinion in this Chamber on how risks are to be prevented and reduced. Mrs Malliori’s report clearly refers to reducing supply and demand, to integrated policies, to the exchange of good practice and to a concern for social re-integration. These are the bases of the report. To achieve these aims, a variety of methods, including prevention programmes, are required, as are assessments of various methods of treatment and rehabilitation, taking into account the work of former drug addicts, their families and the communities that work with them. In my own region of Asturias, the organisation ‘Proyecto Hombre’ operates in this way and obtains results that I can see every day, encouraging local communities to set up, on the one hand, mobile units able to provide information, advice, assistance and first aid in the event of overdoses and, on the other hand – and, in this connection, I do not understand some of the amendments tabled – mobile units to dispense condoms, needles and syringes, something that has been proven to reduce AIDS infection and other illnesses. Furthermore, it is necessary to support the innovative proposals reflecting experiments carried out with, as one approved amendment states, some success by a number of Member States with a view to preventing deaths and reducing risks. I know that, on this subject, there are differences, including in my own group, where my Swedish fellow MEPs do not share this position of mine. In this case, I agreed with an amendment by Mr Davies – defeated in the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy – that proposed authorising and evaluating the professional prescription of heroin to addicts so that they might escape the clutches of dealers. In my own country – and I heard the Commissioner say that he is now ready to approve this option – a pilot programme is to be carried out in one autonomous region, specifically Andalusia, involving chronically ill people who have completed re-integration programmes and entailing controlled doses of heroine being administered professionally only to those drug addicts who have shown that they are unable to give up the drug. An assessment will be carried out in due course. One hundred and thirty people chronically addicted to the drug have been selected to see if the programme produces results. I, for my part, Commissioner, think that this programme is very worthwhile because it may help us all in the future. I shall conclude by pointing out that the report also deals with the situation in prisons. Depending upon the particular country, the situation in prisons is very serious, and there are a very great many prisoners infected with a variety of illnesses, precisely because they have taken drugs and used infected needles and syringes.

Political group: GUE-NGL