Overview:
2 In
the course of our Inquiry it has become inescapably
clear to us that the eradication of drug use is not
achievable and is not therefore either a realistic or
a sensible goal of public policy. The main aim of the
law must be to control and limit the demand for and
the supply of illicit drugs in order to minimise the
serious individual and social harms caused by their
use. At the same time, the law must enable the United
Kingdom to fulfil its international obligations.The
law should be based on the following principles and
purposes:
(i)
as a means of reducing demand, the law is only
one aspect of a broader agenda of health,
prevention and education. It should not undermine
other elements of that agenda – indeed, it
should be able to support them;
(ii) it should reflect the latest scientific
understanding and the social and cultural
attitudes of modern British society;
(iii) it should be realistically enforceable;
(iv) it should infringe personal freedom only to
the degree necessary to restrain serious levels
of harm to users or others;
(v) it should target the drugs that cause the
most harm;
(vi) it should reflect the relative harmfulness
of activities connected with each illicit drug or
category of drugs, and provide for sanctions
proportionate to that harm;
(vii) in its operation, the law should be
accepted by the public as fair, consistent,
enforceable, flexible and just. The proper
exercise of discretion may be an important means
of achieving this.
5 In
this report we use the terms ‘problem’ and
‘casual’ drug use in their now commonly
accepted senses. By ‘problem drug use’ we
mean use whose features include dependence, regular
excessive use and serious health and other social
consequences; it will typically involve the use of
opiates, particularly heroin, cocaine or other
stimulants, often as part of a pattern of polydrug
use. We use ‘casual’ in its dictionary
definition of ‘not regular or permanent or
calculable, varying with circumstances’. In
distinguishing between problem and casual drug use,
we do not imply that the latter is problem free or
does not involve a variety of risks. We only consider
that objective terminology is required to distinguish
between those with serious drug problems and others
who use drugs.
8 The
evidence that we have collected on public attitudes
shows that the public sees the health-related dangers
of drugs as much more of a deterrent to use than
their illegality, the fear of being caught and
punished, availability, or price. There are also
significant differences in public attitudes to
cannabis compared to other drugs.
10 All
the evidence suggests to us that the law plays a
minor part in deterring demand. It is of prime
importance, therefore, that the law should accurately
reflect relative harm in terms of current knowledge
and experience. Only then can it support a public
health agenda of education and prevention.
11 The
law is and must remain the principal means through
which supply is curtailed. But we see no evidence
that severe custodial penalties are deterring
traffickers, or that enforcement, however vigorous,
is having a significant effect on supply.
12 In
considering possible changes to the law in the light
of this evidence, we have been very conscious that
the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 reflects a long
historical process of international agreements on
drug control in which the United Kingdom has been a
major participant. As such, one of its objectives is
to implement this country’s obligations under
the three current international conventions.
13 It
is in the area of drug use, possession and related
acts that the scope left by the international
conventions for different approaches is widest. We
have found that it is not well understood that for
such offences there is express provision for imposing
measures such as treatment, education, rehabilitation
or social reintegration. These measures may be
imposed either in addition or, more importantly, as
an alternative to conviction or punishment.
16 The
United Kingdom is unique in Europe in having a
three-tier classification system by which the law
ranks drugs according to their relative harmfulness
and attaches penalties to the class in which a drug
is placed. We have concluded that this classification
is useful and should be retained. It enables the
relative risks of different drugs to be more
accurately distinguished in terms of current
scientific and sociological knowledge. It also allows
sanctions to be applied which are proportionate to
the harms of the drugs and the activities related to
them.
17
However, the criteria by which drugs are classified
have never been clearly described. We believe that
they should be. We have undertaken this exercise as
best we could within the time, resources, and
expertise available to us, and we hope it will be
built upon. It has led us to conclude that some drugs
should be reclassified so that the classes provide a
more accurate hierarchy of harm and commensurate
sanctions. We recommend the following transfers
between classes:
(i) cannabis from B to C (a recommendation first made
in 1979 by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of
Drugs);
(iii) ecstasy from A to B (a recommendation made to
us by the Association of Chief Police Officers among
others);
(iv) LSD from A to B;
18 ...
the changes will enable the law to reflect more
accurately the risks attached to different drugs.
This will enhance the law’s credibility and the
support it can offer to education and prevention.
When young people know from their own experience that
part of the message is either exaggerated or untrue,
there is a serious risk that they will discount all
of the rest.
22 ...
imprisonment is neither a proportionate response to
the vast majority of possession offences nor an
effective response where the offence is related to
problem drug use.
29 ...
we have encountered no sense that the legislation on
drugs overall needs radical change, we have
encountered much unease and scepticism about the law
and its operation in relation to cannabis. Cannabis
is not a harmless drug. But by any of the main
criteria of harm – mortality, morbidity,
toxicity, addictiveness, and relationship with crime
– it is less harmful to the individual and
society than any of the other major illicit drugs, or
than alcohol and tobacco.
30 Our
conclusion is that the present law on cannabis
produces more harm than it prevents. ... it inhibits
accurate education about the relative risks of
different drugs including the risks of cannabis
itself.
35 Our
overall conclusion is that demand will only be
significantly reduced by education and treatment, not
by the deterrent effect of the law. What is needed is
a less punitive approach to possession offences at
the same time as a more effectively punitive approach
to supply. We see no inconsistency in this. If the
harm caused by drugs is to be significantly reduced,
long custodial sentences for supply are clearly not a
sufficient deterrent. It must be made much more
difficult for traffickers to profit from supplying
drugs.
36 We
have also considered the issue of the therapeutic use
of cannabis. We have nothing to add to the detail of
the Report of the House of Lords Select Committee on
Science and Technology. We are particularly surprised
that one of the grounds for the Government’s
summary rejection of its recommendations should be
anxiety about the capacity of GPs to withstand
pressure for the prescription of cannabis when they
have always been able to prescribe heroin for pain
without any apparent problem.
40 Drug
laws in all countries reflect the tension between
cultural history and changing attitudes and practice.
41 Any
law must win the consent of the majority in a
democracy. Attitudes to drugs, across all age groups,
have shifted and will continue to shift. We believe
we are moving with the grain of that consent,
especially with regard to cannabis. Our proposed
changes ... bring the law into line with public
opinion and its most loyal ally, common sense.
Report:
Chapter
2
32 In England and
Wales recorded deaths associated with drug
dependence, non-dependent abuse, or poisoning by
controlled drugs rose from about 1,800 to 2,100
between 1979 and 1997 [Office of National Statistics
Mortality Statistics].
Public attitudes
55 As part of our
work, we felt that it was important to try and learn
something about public attitudes towards drugs, the
harms associated with them, and the role of the law.
A survey was commissioned from MORI which provided
some surprising responses and proved particularly
revealing about attitudes towards drugs in
contemporary Britain.
56 The surveys were
conducted among adults and school students, and asked
a range of questions concerning the perceived
harmfulness of different drugs. The adult survey
involved face-to-face interviews with 1,645 people
aged 16 and 59 years between 9 – 13 April 1999.
The schools survey was conducted between 18 January
and 12 February 1999, and collected completed
questionnaires from 3,529 pupils aged 11-16 years.
57 One key question
was how people assessed the relative harmfulness of
different drugs. Where adults were concerned,
substantial majorities of 90 per cent or so across
all age ranges – from 16 to 59 years, judged
heroin, cocaine, ecstasy and amphetamines to be
either very or fairly harmful. By contrast, only
one-third judged cannabis to be as harmful, and again
this judgement hardly varied with age. Attitudes
tended to vary with age where alcohol and tobacco
were concerned, with a marked tendency to see these
substances as increasingly harmful with increasing
age. Among adults from 18 to 59 years, cannabis was
seen as by far the least harmful of all these drugs.
58 Public attitudes,
therefore, do not lump all drugs together, but adopt
a more considered view of the harmfulness of
different substances; a view, moreover, which tends
to conform with medical and scientific opinion (see
Chapter Three, paragraphs 23 and 24). The one
exception to this is that people judge ecstasy to be
almost as harmful as heroin and cocaine, whereas
scientific opinion tends to judge ecstasy as
considerably less harmful.
59 In the schools
survey, attitudes towards the perceived harmfulness
of drugs were different in important ways. Children
aged 11-12 years offered a much simpler testimony,
seeing all illicit drugs (including cannabis) as more
or less equally harmful. In contrast, 11 to 12
year-olds see alcohol and tobacco as relatively much
less harmful, and this view does not change with age
among 11-16 year-olds. Attitudes towards cannabis
change considerably as young people grow older –
so that by age 15-16 years they see cannabis in the
same way as adults, that is as among the least
harmful of drugs.
60 Young people also
reported increasingly with age that they knew someone
of their own age who had smoked cannabis. By age
15-16 years, only about one in ten said that they did
not know someone who had used cannabis. Young people
of all ages, as with adults, see heroin, cocaine,
amphetamines and ecstasy as very harmful.
61 Between the ages
of 11 and 16 years the perceptions of children as
they grow older gradually move to approximate the
views of adults. The exception is attitude to alcohol
and tobacco: only adults see these substances as
particularly harmful. The most frequent reasons given
by both children and adults for people not taking
drugs were ‘health reason’ (33% and 51%)
and ‘just don’t want to take drugs’
(27% and 56%). By comparison only 19% of children and
30% of adults mentioned ‘illegality’ and
12% of children and 17% of adults cited ‘fear of
being caught by the police’.
62 People did
nevertheless want to see strong and effective drug
laws. Two-thirds of adults thought that the law
against drugs ‘is not tough enough’, and
tended not to agree that the use of drugs was merely
a matter of personal choice. Once again, views
differed sharply between different drugs. Whereas
two-thirds expressed the view that drug laws should
be tougher, approximately one-half of all adults felt
that the law should be changed so that the use of
cannabis was no longer illegal. In the schools survey
a higher number of children and young people said
that fear of being caught by their parents (21%) was
more of an influence than fear of being caught by the
police. The latter view was held a little more
strongly among younger age groups, although in all
age groups a clear majority of those who expressed a
view felt that the law with regard to cannabis should
be changed.
63 The MORI survey
evidence suggests that people view the health
consequences of drug use as a more important
deterrent than legal controls. They do want strong
and effective drug controls, but do not believe that
the police alone can be effective in curbing the
damage caused by drug misuse. When asked to state
what priority the police should give to a variety of
different offences, heroin dealing and sexual
assaults were seen as by far the most important. They
were mentioned by two-thirds of respondents. Assault,
racial violence and drink-driving were mentioned by
one-third, with burglary and muggings mentioned by
one in five. At the lower end of the spectrum heroin
users (as opposed to dealers) were mentioned by only
8%, and cannabis dealers by 9%. Cannabis users, on
the other hand, were hardly mentioned at all as a
police priority – by less than half of one per
cent of respondents.
64 It is clear on
this evidence that cannabis stands out as a special
case in public attitudes towards drugs in modern
Britain. It is seen by adults as by far the least
harmful of all drugs, including alcohol and tobacco.
The possession of cannabis is seen as the very lowest
of priorities for the allocation of police resources.
A majority of adults, young and old, even feel that
its use should be legalised. Where other drugs are
concerned, public opinion fully supports strong drug
laws, while emphasising concern with the health risks
resulting from drug use. We were particularly
impressed by the uniformity of these attitudes
towards cannabis and other drugs across different
social groups and age groups. Perhaps most
surprisingly in terms of the way in which public
debate is often constructed, there was no evidence of
a ‘generation gap’ in public attitudes
towards the use of cannabis.
65 This last point
perhaps indicates as well as anything how far public
attitudes towards drug use may have changed in the
past thirty years. Unfortunately, there are no
directly similar surveys from the past to compare
with our own findings. The MORI poll which we
commissioned is undoubtedly the most comprehensive
survey of its type to be as yet conducted in Britain.
Even so, we can offer some idea of how attitudes seem
to have changed on some questions, although
unfortunately most of these relate only to the legal
status of cannabis.
Chapter 3
1 In introducing the
legislation in 1970 [the MDA], the Home Secretary,
Mr. Callaghan, said ‘The object here is to make,
so far as possible, a more sensible differentiation
between drugs. It will divide them according to their
accepted dangers and harmfulness in the light of
current knowledge and it will provide for changes to
be made in the classification in the light of new
scientific knowledge.’
We have given
considerable attention to this area because of the
importance of getting it right if the law is to be
credible, proportionate and just and if it is to be
able to support accurate education in the harmfulness
of drugs.
4 Transfers between
Classes on the other hand have occurred only twice.
The first occasion was the transfer of nicodicodine
from Class A to Class B in 1973. The second followed
the only full review of the Classes carried out since
1971 by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs
[1979]. The Council was broadly satisfied with the
classification of controlled drugs. It made only two
recommendations: that cannabis and cannabis resin be
transferred from Class B to Class C, which was not
implemented, and that methaqualone (a sedative) be
moved from Class C to Class B, which was.
Criteria for
classifying drugs
5 The explicit
criteria in section 1 (2) of the MDA are (1) whether
the drug is being misused or (2) whether it is likely
to be misused and (3) whether the misuse in either
case is having or could have harmful effects
sufficient to constitute a social problem. There
appears to be no explicit criterion for deciding
which drugs are more harmful than others and so
should go in Class A rather than B or C. The Council,
however, deduced that the nature of the mischief to
which misuse might give rise was a criterion implicit
in the threefold classification and its link to
penalties.
7 We believe that
the present classification of drugs in the MDA should
be reviewed to take account of modern developments in
medical, scientific and sociological knowledge. The
main criterion should continue to be that of
dangerousness but the criteria should be made clear.
The relative dangerousness of drugs is determined by
a number of factors, some applying to the individual,
others to society. The main justification for
controlling drugs lies in the harm that their use
causes to society. However, we should make it clear
that, as a matter of principle, it is right for the
law to take into account harm that drugs cause to
users themselves, as well as to other people affected
by users or to the community at large. It is widely
agreed that there are cases in which the law may
properly try to protect people from harming
themselves. These are cases – seatbelts and
motorcyclists’ helmets are examples – in
which the damage is serious, almost always comes
about unintentionally, and is hard to reverse. This
is the kind of risk that is associated in varying
degrees with dangerous drugs, and the case is even
stronger to the extent that they take away the power
of choice. For these reasons, we think, as most
people do, that the law should take into account the
harms that drugs do to the people who use them. In
any case, it is impossible in fact to separate harms
to users from harms to others; self-inflicted damage
usually results in costs to others. The harm to the
individual as a consequence of the pharmacological
effects of a drug lends itself best to objective
evaluation. Initially at least, this harm is likely
to be the best indicator of how strictly a drug needs
to be controlled.
8 Personal harm may
be assessed on the basis of four factors:
i) risks of the drug
itself: acute (short-term) and chronic (long-term)
toxicity;
ii) risks due to the route of use;
iii) extent to which the drug controls behaviour
(addictiveness/dependency);
iv) ease of stopping.
The relative dangers
of each factor vary from drug to drug. For example,
heroin is highly toxic acutely but may cause little
chronic toxicity provided it is used in a sterile
fashion. The benzodiazepines have relatively little
acute toxicity but may be difficult to stop taking
after long-term use.
Social risks
19 Some forms of
social harm are a direct consequence of intoxication,
for example road traffic accidents. Others come from
addiction and dependence: the drug controls behaviour
to an extent that has detrimental effects on all
aspects of social functioning. In severe cases this
can lead to complete personal collapse with loss of
job, family and ability to look after oneself. It may
also lead to acquisitive crime in order to obtain the
funds to buy further supplies of the drug. A third
area relates to the medical complications and the
costs of treating drug use and dependence.
20 Social harm is
hard to quantify. The health care impact is difficult
to estimate because the costs of treating addiction
are fixed arbitrarily by the availability of
treatment resources. Also they are only a fraction of
the full medical costs. Unknown extra costs include
those due to accidents, infections and mental
illness. Other social costs, for example from crime,
are hard to measure because it may not always be the
drug use that leads to the commission of criminal
offences. It is, however, possible to reach a
reasoned assessment of relative social harm without
precisely quantified estimates. The addictive and
dependency potential of a drug can be used to a large
extent as a proxy for the social risks - a highly
addictive drug will lead to a great deal of social
harm.
21 Such evidence as
there is suggests that the health and other social
costs attributable to illicit drugs are small
compared with the health and social costs of alcohol
and tobacco. A recent French study has estimated that
6% of the costs of responding to social problems
caused by drugs are attributable to illicit drugs as
compared with 40% to tobacco and 54% to alcohol.
31 The British
Medical Association state ‘The acute toxicity of
cannabinoids is extremely low: they are very safe
drugs and no deaths have been directly attributed to
their recreational or therapeutic use’.
34 Given the ranking
that alcohol and tobacco have in the order of
dangerous drugs, it is an obvious question why they
and drugs controlled under the MDA should not be
treated similarly: either alcohol and tobacco should
be added to the appropriate Classes under the MDA or
drugs that are no more dangerous than they should be
treated as alcohol and tobacco are now treated. We
resist this argument. In the first place, it is
simply a fact that the use of alcohol and tobacco is
so widespread and familiar that an attempt to
prohibit their supply by law would lead to widespread
resentment and law-breaking (as happened with the
Prohibition experiment in the United States from
1920-33). Conversely, the present law against the
drugs controlled by the MDA enjoys widespread public
acceptance, with the exception of certain aspects of
its operation against cannabis.
35 The cases of
alcohol and tobacco are in any case not the same.
Smoking tobacco is widely regarded as a bad and
dangerous habit. Many who smoke wish that they could
stop and measures are taken to prevent smoking in
public places, to limit advertising and so on. It is
a reasonable social aim that the use of tobacco
should eventually disappear, even though that aim
cannot appropriately be pursued by legal prohibition.
Alcohol is a more complicated case. Although it is a
dangerous drug and causes enormous social costs and
harm, it is also used by many people moderately and
non-destructively. It is strictly the misuse of
alcohol that needs to be prevented, and while the
ways in which this can best be done may be debated,
control under the MDA is not one of them.
38 The assessment of
some features must remain subjective but we believe
that it is possible to reach an objective estimate of
relative harmfulness by assessing drugs against the
following factors (discussed in detail above):
i) their potential
for leading to dependency and addiction;
ii) toxicity;
iii) risk of overdose;
iv) risk to life and health in longer term;
v) injectability;
vi) association with crime;
vii) association with problems for communities;
viii) public health costs.
40 To put the risks
in context, if alcohol and tobacco were assessed for
control under the MDA using these criteria, alcohol
would be classed as B bordering on A, while
cigarettes would probably be on the borderline
between B and C.
Chapter 5:
Non-trafficking Offences
2 Possession is the
key issue. The United Nations conventions permit more
latitude in this area than with trafficking offences.
Parties are required under article 3, paragraph 2, of
the 1988 convention to establish possession for
personal consumption as a criminal offence under
their domestic law. This requirement, unlike that for
trafficking offences, is subject to a country’s
‘constitutional principles and the basic
concepts of its legal system’. This is
particularly relevant for those countries whose
constitutions enshrine principles of personal
freedom, including the freedom to harm oneself.
6 Whatever the penal
sanctions provided, article 3, paragraph 4(d), of the
1988 convention permits measures for the treatment,
education, aftercare, rehabilitation or social
reintegration of the offender to be provided as
alternatives to conviction or punishment.
Chapter 6: Cannabis
5 In their evidence
to the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and
Technology, the Department of Health said
‘cannabis is now the third most commonly
consumed drug after alcohol and tobacco’.
6 Both our MORI
surveys and our meetings with young people make it
clear that there is no difficulty in obtaining the
drug, nor is there any sense that the law is a
deterrent for the majority. This is so despite record
levels of seizures by police and customs.
8 There is no
evidence that the presence of THC in higher
concentrations leads to significantly higher health
risks, just as it cannot be claimed that the risks
would be eliminated if only lower-strength varieties
of cannabis were available.
20 The British
Medical Association has said ‘The acute toxicity
of cannabinoids is extremely low: they are very safe
drugs and no deaths have been directly attributed to
their recreational or therapeutic use.’ The
Lancet published an article summarising the evidence
on the most probable adverse health and psychological
consequences of acute and chronic use, and its
editorial in the same issue comments that ‘...on
the evidence summarised by Hall and Solowij, it would
be reasonable to judge cannabis less of a threat than
alcohol or tobacco....We...say that, on the medical
evidence available, moderate indulgence in cannabis
has little ill-effect on health, and that decisions
to ban or legalise cannabis should be based on other
considerations.’
21 New medical and
scientific knowledge can still be expected to add to
the evidence of long-term harm from cannabis, despite
the length of time it has been available and the
extent of its use. Nevertheless, as the House of
Lords report remarks, the harms must not be
overstated. When cannabis is systematically compared
with other drugs against the main criteria of harm
(mortality, morbidity, toxicity, addictiveness and
relationship with crime), it is less harmful to the
individual and society than any of the other major
illicit drugs or than alcohol and tobacco. This is
why our consideration of the relative harmfulness of
drugs has led us to the conclusion that cannabis is
wrongly placed in Class B of Schedule 2 to the MDA.
72 A primary concern
of ours is minimising the adverse, unnecessary and
disproportionate criminal consequences for very large
numbers of otherwise law-abiding, usually young,
people. Our recommendations are intended to support
the education, prevention and treatment elements of a
broader health agenda, which itself reflects the
relative risks of different drugs including cannabis.
75 There can be no
doubt that, in implementing the law, the present
concentration on cannabis weakens respect for the
law. We have encountered a wide sense of unease,
indeed scepticism, about the present control regime
in relation to cannabis. It inhibits accurate
education about the relative risks of different drugs
including the risks of cannabis itself. It gives
large numbers of otherwise law-abiding people a
criminal record. It inordinately penalises and
marginalises young people for what might be little
more than youthful experimentation. It bears most
heavily on young people in the streets of inner
cities who are also more likely to be poor and
members of minority ethnic communites. The evidence
strongly indicates that the current law and its
operation creates more harm than the drug itself.
14 More far-reaching
research is needed to provide a better understanding
of the precise dynamics and causal links in the
drugs-crime relationship, and better evidence about
the factors that influence the effects of treatment.
There is a particular need to evaluate the
cost-effectiveness of different interventions,
whether involving treatment or not. This is necessary
to inform future decisions on what seems to us an
unsatisfactory distribution of overall drugs
expenditure, with 62% going on enforcement and only
13% on treatment services.
Recommendations:
1. The information
and research base should be given renewed attention.
In particular:
i) routine
statistics should be improved to ensure that gaps
in our understanding of the scale, nature and
extent of drug use are reduced; and
ii) enforcement and treatment policies should be
evaluated thoroughly.
2. The present
classification of drugs in the MDA should be reviewed
to take account of modern developments in medical,
sociological and scientific knowledge.
3.The main
classification criterion should continue to be that
of dangerousness.
4. The chronic
health risks from each drug should be kept under
continuous review.
6. There should be
clear criteria for the future to govern additions to,
and transfers between, the classes.
14 The Advisory
Council for the Misuse of Drugs should continue to be
the body that has the statutory responsibility for
considering and making recommendations to Ministers
on the classification of new drugs and for keeping
the existing classes under review.
15 Future reports
from the Council should clearly state its methods and
findings on such matters.
32 The law should
take full advantage of the leeway left by the United
Nations conventions to deal with the less serious
situations in a non-punitive way.
64 The cultivation
of small numbers of cannabis plants for personal use
should be a separate offence from production and
should be treated in the same way as possession of
cannabis, being neither arrestable nor imprisonable
and attracting the same range of sanctions.
72 More far-reaching
research is needed to provide a better understanding
of the precise dynamics and causal links in the
drugs-crime relationship and better evidence about
the factors that influence treatment effects. There
is a particular need to evaluate the
cost-effectiveness of different interventions, in
order to inform future decisions on distribution of
overall drugs expenditure.
Appendix 2
2 Terms of Reference
2.1 The Inquiry is
asked to:
a. describe the
purpose and intention behind the existing
relevant legislation and place them in their
historical context including the U.K. obligations
under the United Nations drug conventions and to
the European Union.
b. review and
assess the current goals of drug misuse control.
c. assess the
adequacy of the existing relevant legislation in
meeting current needs.
d. compile a
list of possible revisions to the existing
relevant legislation pointing out agreement,
conflicts and possible compromises if current
legislation is found to be inadequate for some or
all of the needs identified.
e. select the
most cogent proposals for revision of the
existing relevant legislation and examine the
implications of their implementation.
GOVERNMENT
REPLY TO THE REPORT OF THE INDEPENDENT INQUIRY INTO
THE MISUSE OF DRUGS ACT 1971
Recommendation 1.
The information research base should be given renewed
attention. In particular:
(i) Routine statistics should be improved to ensure
that gaps in our understanding of the scale, nature
and extent of drug use are reduced, and;
(ii) enforcement and treatment policies should be
evaluated thoroughly.
6. The Police
Foundation is quite right to identify the
importance of a sound information and research
base to inform the National Strategy [see reply
to Recommendation 72 below].
Recommendation 2.
The present classification of drugs in the Misuse of
Drugs Act should be reviewed to take account of
modern developments in medical, sociological and
scientific knowledge.
Recommendation 3. The main classification criteria
should continue to be that of dangerousness.
Recommendation 6. There should be clear criteria for
the future to govern additions to, and transfers
between, the classes.
Recommendation 14. The Advisory Council for the
Misuse of Drugs should continue to be the body that
has the statutory responsibility for considering and
making recommendations to Ministers on the
classification of new drugs and for keeping existing
classes under review.
Recommendation 15. Future reports from the Council
should clearly state its methods and findings on such
matters.
8. The Police
Foundation's recommendation that the Advisory
Council for the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) should
retain the statutory responsibility for advising
the Government on the classification of new drugs
is very welcome. ACMD was established by the
Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. It has served
successive Governments well in the intervening
period and its members, who give their time free
of charge, bring an unrivalled depth of knowledge
and experience to the Council.
9. It is part of
ACMD's statutory remit to keep drug misuse under
review and the Council has always been ready to
look at individual drugs (e.g. ecstasy in 1997)
on a more proactive basis when it believes this
would be helpful.
10. The criteria
for guiding the assessment of any given drug was
set out in a 1996 protocol agreed by the two
sub-groups of the Council that have
responsibility for pharmacological and
epidemiological assessment of specific drugs.
This year, and very much in keeping with the
Police Foundation thinking, ACMD has been
reviewing this protocol and considering whether
it might be improved, perhaps by drawing upon
best practice elsewhere. A special joint meeting
of these two sub-groups took place at the end of
August and there were presentations from the
European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug
Addictions (EMCDDA) and colleagues from Holland.
Further meetings have trialed possible variants
and have helped to developed thinking. It is
hoped that proposals for a revised risk
assessment protocol will be put to the full
Council of the ACMD during 2001.
11. The
Government agrees with the Police Foundation's
conclusion that the main classification criteria
should continue to be that of dangerousness. As
the Police Foundation's report recognises,
assessments of the sort that ACMD are required to
make when considering the harmfulness of drugs
must contain an element of subjectivity, but the
Government and the Council agree that reports
from the Council should clearly state
methodology.
Recommendation 72.
More far reaching research is needed to provide a
better understanding of the precise dynamics and
causal links in the drugs crime relationship and
better evidence about the factors that influence
treatment effects. There is a particular need to
evaluate the cost effectiveness of different
interventions, in order to inform future decisions on
distribution of overall drugs expenditure.
56. As already
mentioned, the Government recognises the
importance of a sound research base and has made
significant money available for research in
support of the National Drugs Strategy. But the
Inquiry is right to identify the importance of
these specific areas, which are being addressed
through the following pieces of research:
The drugs-crime
relationship is being assessed through the
NEW-ADAM programme. The latest report, Home
Office Research Study 205, which was published in
August 2000, included authoritative measurement
over time of changes in drug use and offending,
in two locations (Nottingham and Sunderland).
Evidence about
treatment effects is being gathered through the
NTORS research programme, which the Department of
Health is continuing to support, and also through
a study published by the Home Office in August,
concerned with methadone maintenance (Home Office
Research Findings No.120).
The cost
effectiveness of different interventions is
receiving heightened attention. For instance, the
on-going evaluation of the effectiveness of
arrest referral includes an economic component.
Also, the study of methadone maintenance, just
mentioned, included a cost effectiveness
component.