Pubdate: Fri, 20 Jul 2001
Source: Scotsman (UK)
Copyright: The Scotsman Publications Ltd 2001
Contact:  http://www.scotsman.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/406
Author: Stephen McGinty

DRUGS AGENCIES GANG TOGETHER IN FRESH STREET BATTLE

IN THE war against drugs, Scotland has lost every battle. Scots are taking 
more illegal drugs than ever before, starting at a younger age, consuming 
for longer and enjoying a wider selection of chemical stimulants, 
hallucinogens and depressants. Availability has doubled, the street price 
has halved and in many areas of Edinburgh and Glasgow you can have heroin, 
cannabis or cocaine delivered faster than a pizza.

The statistics, stripped of the cloak of human interest, are depressingly 
frank. In Scotland, an average of 300 people die of drug abuse each year, 
almost three times the rate of Holland, a country with a population three 
times the size. In Glasgow, where half of all our problem drug users 
reside, the figure has exploded by almost 80 per cent in the last eight 
years to 15,368.

Drug smugglers are now so successful prices have dropped to within reach of 
pocket money. Temazepam tablets are as little as pounds1 while ecstasy, 
cannabis and amphetamines can be bought for a fiver.

In police enforcement, the number of offences under the 1971 Misuse of 
Drugs Act was 5,000 in 1988. This has leapt to 29,000 in 1997.

A possible bright note is that seizures of controlled drugs in the past 
decade have increased by more than 350 per cent, from 6,000 to 28,000, a 
spot that dims considerably as drug workers conclude that seizures have 
made no difference to supply on the streets.

It is official: Scotland, whether we choose to admit it or not, is hip-deep 
in drugs.

Yet, almost a million parents teenagers and children approve - 22.5 per 
cent of the Scottish population have taken illegal drugs. The dilemma 
facing the Scottish executive is that the vast majority of illicit drug 
users are gainfully employed and happy to drift into a heightened state on 
ecstasy over the weekend, mellow out over a joint or burn up a Friday night 
on speed or cocaine. They don't register on official statistics because 
their lives haven't unravelled.

The creation of the Scottish parliament has given a new impetus to the 
fight against drugs, away from those dark days of politicians in baseball 
caps talking to "da kids".

Action in Partnership, the Scottish executive's document, has linked up the 
country's disparate drug agencies . Critics, however, insist they are 
turning back towards the past and an adaptation of "Just Say No", where 
young people are consistently presented with the worst-care scenario, an 
image regularly shattered by the experience of their friends.

Over the next few years a co-ordinated approach will be set up, each school 
will have effective management for drug misuse, training and education on 
the dangers . Drugs are to be tackled across four fields: young people are 
to be better informed; there will be support for communities ; treatment 
for addicts is to be improved; and availability of drugs is to be reduced.

At Scotland Against Drugs, the government's prevention agency, director 
Alastair Ramsay is asking for time. "We've never been so co-ordinated and 
we need five years to see if the approach works. If it doesn't, I think 
Angus McKay [minister for drugs misuse] is a big enough man to say this 
worked and we will continue it or this didn't work, what else can we try?"

Mr Ramsay is strongly opposed to any plans to decriminalise cannabis on the 
grounds that health risks have been consistently undersold, wider 
availability would lead to greater use and such a change would wreck the 
executive's current plans.

"We need stability and consistency to see if our approach works," he 
argued. "All that would change if decriminalisation was introduced. "

A review in five years' time would dove-tail nicely with Glasgow 
University's Centre for Drug Misuse which, this summer, has embarked on a 
five-year study of the efficacy of a range of treatments of addicts.

A large survey of the drug habits of the Scottish population is expected 
later this year from the centre . No-one is expecting a drop in user rates, 
more realistic will be a repeat of a chilling sentence from the last study 
in 1996 that reported: "the upward trend in drug misuse has not yet peaked".

For those more closely associated with hard drug users, the discussion over 
decriminalisation of cannabis is a red herring. Although the Scottish Drugs 
Forum would welcome the drug's reduction from a Class B to a Class C drug, 
it would also welcome more greater funding for addiction centres.

"We have a lack of rehab centre, detox centres, there is a dreadful lack of 
services in rural areas and all those who want to get on to methadone 
cannot do so," said Kathleen Travers, of the SDF. "There is too much talk 
about the decriminalisation of cannabis. That is not where the problem 
lies. The problem lies with hard drug users whose lives have spun out of 
control."

A major problem is a lack of drug treatment centres. When a headmaster 
calls Scotland Against Drugs for advice on how to deal with a 14-year- old 
girl on heroin, he is referred to the girl's GP. Where the Netherlands 
offer a one-stop-shop, with centres in every major city and towns offering 
a range of addiction treatments for alcohol to heroin , Scotland remains a 
jumbled variety of services, all complaining of under-funding, but saying 
the executive has made a step in the right direction.

"The executive agreed that for too long there was too much money put into 
enforcement at the expense of treatment. That is being redressed," said Ms 
Travers.

But what should we be doing? When you ask one experienced drugs worker what 
he would do if the First Minister is impotent over the reserved drugs law, 
he smiles . "I would instruct a Royal Commission to carry out a review of 
the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act.

"The law was written by the finest legal minds in the country, but at a 
time when there was a few thousands addicts in Britain. No-one, I repeat, 
no-one could have imagined a situation when we have over 12,000 hard drug 
addicts in Glasgow alone.

"Legalisation is not an option, but a serious re-assessment of the drug 
sentencing laws and the approach of the police is."

As another drug worker said: "If this is a war, then it's Vietnam."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Beth