I think you broadly answer it in your own post - you will never eradicate problem users, the same way you never eradicate problem drinkers, but you ensure the support structures are there for the people who need them - treat addiction as a health problem rather than a criminal one - there's quite a lot in the Portgual study I shared about that, and we manage to do it to some extent already with alcoholics and people trying to quit smoking.

Problematic use of drugs (legal and illegal) is strongly correlated with poverty and deprivation - creating a society where not so many people feel the need to alter the reality to quite that extent they do and quite as often as they do is a much more worthwhile ambition than more prohibition.

Given the amount of money thrown at this over the decades and the number of people convicted, I would challenge that assertion - how much more does he want us to spend? how many more people in prison?

You are someone who puts a lot of stock in human nature - basically every culture in human history have used psychoactive substances, so there is nothing unusual or unnatural in people's desire to do these things (there are many examples of animals seeking natural 'highs' in the animal kingdom) - knowing that as a reality; we either try to fight it, or we accept it and adjust our approach - I think it's fairly obvious what makes more sense.

The reality is that any level of evidence-based approach to this problem would conclude that Portugal's (and other's) approach has been astronomically more successful in 5 years than the war on drugs has in 50 - the question is why do we continue to bang our head against the same wall?

Agree.

You only have to look at how drastically the number of people smoking cigarettes has reduced over the last 10-20 years.. it wasn't achieved through prohibition or tougher penalties, it was achieved through educating people on the risks and providing support for those struggling to overcome their addiction - we know it works!

Charging £13 for 20 and making 10s unavailable might have had more to do with it.

Well the Scots have the answer, ban all the hurty words

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You can't actually believe that?

That changed in 2017 - smoking rates were plummeting long before that.

Sorry, no idea where you’ve got the impression I want to demonise cigarette smokers - I used cigarettes as an example of how you can reduce usage of a substance without the need to ban it.

And to be clear, I am also not advocating that people should be encouraged to take illegal drugs, simply that they should have the choice to do so if they want to.