Prohibition of drugs leaves the supply of drugs to some of the worst people in society. There is a demand for drugs, under prohibition this is met by unregulated, uncontrollable criminals. So instead of being supplied by legitimate, tax paying companies drugs are supplied by some of the worst people in society. The profits go straight into funding foreign civil wars, buying guns that threaten our streets and funding extravagant lifestyles for criminal bosses.
Instead of this we could have legitimate, tax paying, law abiding companies in control of the supply of drugs. This would be far better for the economy than leaving it to gangsters.
A tiny minority of cigarettes and alcohol are bought on the black market. And when cigarettes are brought into this country, its usually by someone returning from a foreign trip to a country where the tax on cigarettes is lower. The tax has still been paid, just in a different country and at a lower rate. The proceeds going to legitimate sources, just in another country. The cigarettes people are buying are not homemade cigarettes but cigarettes made by international companies. That is totally different to what happens when it comes to illegal drugs.
Existing suppliers of drugs could never hope to compete with legitimate companies. I would never buy a bottle of vodka made by some man i met on the street because i can go into a shop and buy a bottle of vodka from a producer i trust. People currently don’t have that option with illegal drugs, under a legalized system they would have that option and would take it.
Crime would decrease because we could liberate police officers from spending time fighting an unwinnable ‘war on drugs’ and refocus them on real crime like murder, rape, theft etc.

Putting someone in jail/fining them/giving them community service for possession of a drug is unjust, it should be their choice and not the government’s what they put in their body. They are not harming anyone by mere possession, and putting them in jail at huge cost to the taxpayer ruins their life and costs us all. Sending someone to jail for drug posession is a waste of money as well as being unjust.
We allow people to drink alcohol (a drug) and smoke nicotine (a drug) but we criminalize people who take some less harmful drugs. This inconsistenty is part of the injustice of criminalizing people for posession of certain drugs.
No one disputes the harm done by drugs, the question is how to treat the problem. Decades of rising drug use and drug related crime demonstrate that prohibition doesn’t work.
The vast majority of drug users do not committ other crimes to pay for their drugs. The real crime is the mugging, not the activity they are trying to pay for. People steal to buy all kinds of things, but it is the theft that should be the crime.
Many drug addicts committ crime to feed their habit, but not every drug user is a drug addict. Millions of people take illegal drugs including many lawyers, teachers, doctors etc. They lead productive lives, why should the threat of jail hang over them because the government disagrees with their choice of drug?
Prison does ruin someone’s life, and it certainly does nothing to cure addiction. It makes it more likely that people will be dependent on drugs for the forseeable future as they have hardly any chance of getting a decent job with a criminal record.
The public are not protected. Drugs are everywhere, dangerous drug dealers are common, drug related crime soars and so does drug addiction. That is prohibition.
Would anyone think that the solution to our alcohol problem is to jail anyone who has a drink? Probably not. No most people think that rehab is the answer for alcoholics and that moderate drinkers should be largely left alone until they break some other law. So why do people think that for other drugs, some less dangerous than alcohol, the answer is criminal penalities? Even when the idea of treating drug addiction as a criminal problem has been tested to destruction and shown to be a complete failure.
Keeping slaves violates the rights of others to live their life as they choose, its nothing like taking a drug. It is the prohibition on drugs that violates the rights of others, not the drug taking itself.
Drinking alcohol isn’t morally superior to taking illegal drugs just because the government has a hypocritical, inconsistent policy on drugs.

Our drugs problem is a public health problem and making it a criminal one has been part of the problem, definitely not a solution.
If drugs were legalized they could be regulated for quality ensuring people do not die from taking a bad drug.
They could be labelled as cigarettes are with public health warnings so that people know exactly what risk they are taking.
Taxes on drugs could help pay for NHS run rehab programs.
It would be easier to prevent underage drug taking if legitimate companies with licences to lose were put in control rather than drug dealers who have no problem selling to children, its the same crime as selling to an adult.

Define "work." Do we mean that prohibition does not stop drug use? If so, history shows us that prohibition does not work.

There is no evidence to show that prohibition is succeeding. The question we must ask ourselves is, "What are the benefits of criminalising any drug?" If, after examining all the available evidence, we find that the costs outweigh the benefits, then we must seek an alternative policy.
Legalisation is not a cure-all but it does allow us to address many of the problems associated with drug use, and those created by prohibition. The time has come for an effective and pragmatic drug policy.

Black people are over ten times more likely to be imprisoned for drug offences than whites. Arrests for drug offences are notoriously discretionary allowing enforcement to easily target a particular ethnic group. Prohibition has fostered this stereotyping of black people.
Legalisation removes a whole set of laws that are used to disproportionately bring black people into contact with the criminal justice system. It would help to redress the over representation of black drug offenders in prison.

The illegal drugs market makes up 8% of all world trade (around £300 billion a year). Whole countries are run under the corrupting influence of drug cartels. Prohibition also enables developed countries to wield vast political power over producer nations under the auspices of drug control programmes.
Legalisation returns lost revenue to the legitimate taxed economy and removes some of the high-level corruption. It also removes a tool of political interference by foreign countries against producer nations.

For too long policy makers have used prohibition as a smoke screen to avoid addressing the social and economic factors that lead people to use drugs. Most illegal and legal drug use is recreational. Poverty and despair are at the root of most problematic drug use and it is only by addressing these underlying causes that we can hope to significantly decrease the number of problematic users.

Recent research shows that nearly half of all 15-16 year olds have used an illegal drug. Up to one and a half million people use ecstasy every weekend. Amongst young people, illegal drug use is seen as normal. Intensifying the ‘war on drugs’ is not reducing demand. In Holland, where cannabis laws are far less harsh, drug usage is amongst the lowest in Europe.
Legalisation accepts that drug use is normal and that it is a social issue, not a criminal justice one. How we deal with it is up to all of us to decide.
In 1970 there were 9000 convictions or cautions for drug offences and 15% of young people had used an illegal drug. In 1995 the figures were 94 000 and 45%. Prohibition doesn’t work.

A wealth of disinformation about drugs and drug use is given to us by ignorant and prejudiced policy-makers and media who peddle myths upon lies for their own ends. This creates many of the risks and dangers associated with drug use.
Legalisation would help us to disseminate open, honest and truthful information to users and non-users to help them to make decisions about whether and how to use. We could begin research again on presently illicit drugs to discover all their uses and effects – both positive and negative.

Prohibition unnecessarily criminalises millions of otherwise law-abiding people. It removes the responsibility for distribution of drugs from policy makers and hands it over to unregulated, sometimes violent dealers.
Legalisation restores our right to use drugs responsibly to change the way we think and feel. It enables controls and regulations to be put in place to protect the vulnerable.