A senior Scottish police officer has called for a radical change to tackling drugs misuse, suggesting the criminal justice system was “probably deleterious” as it pushed people into the more harmful environment of prison.
Steve Johnson, Assistant Chief Constable at Police Scotland, suggested Scottish politicians should have the “confidence and courage” to change their approach and see drug abuse as a health crisis rather than a criminal justice issue.
Giving evidence to the Commons Scottish Affairs Committee, he said the current system for handling drug-users was like a "hamster wheel".
He told MPs: "It's just a matter of time. They come through the custody door, they get processed through the criminal justice system, go in through the sheriffs' courts, they go into prison.
"Of those people who come out, 11 per cent die within the first month of having been released, according to the statistics. But police officers get used to this carousel, this sense of hopelessness."
Mr Johnson recounted how drug-related deaths had doubled in three years; from 539 in 2015 to 1,067 in 2018.
Pressed on how the Home Office approached drug policy, he said it felt “very punitive" and suggested there was a "clear tension" between upholding the law as it stood and adhering to a police officer's first duty: to protect life.
The senior police officer noted how currently there were more than 61,000 problematic drug-users in Scotland, a number which was on the increase, and for the majority of them the end-result would be death.
He pointed out how the law said the mere possession of a tiny amount of a substance should lead to a warning or an arrest.
“That puts people into custody. That potentially exposes them to more drugs or different drugs in the prison system and puts them back out into society that, unfortunately for most of them, will mean they are going to die.”
Mr Johnson went on: "The criminal justice process is probably deleterious; it's actually pushing people into a place where there is more harm.
"Whilst it might be statistically a criminal justice outcome, it doesn't seem to me to present a good social justice[outcome] in terms of rehabilitation and putting people back out into society," he added.
Meanwhile, Jim Duffy, a retired Strathclyde Police officer who now works for Law Enforcement Action Partnership UK, told the evidence session that the war on drugs was "completely lost and unwinnable," if MPs continued with the same approach to tackling the issue of drugs misuse.
"The way forward is not to follow the current Misuse of Drugs Act, which has been in place for 48 years and has been an out-and-out failure. We need a radical rethink and we need a change,” he declared.
Mr Duffy argued society needed to take the issue of drugs misuse away from criminals and “legislate and control".
He added: "Lives are being saved all over the world, in Canada and America, where they've legalised it in certain states; there aren't the same number of fatalities.”
Martin Powell, from the Transform Drug Policy Foundation, argued that allowing the creation of drugs consumption rooms, such as that proposed in Glasgow, in a “really cautious, piloted way,” could allow Scotland to explore whether deregulation could be beneficial.
"So, no big bangs, no sudden shocks to the system; a very careful, cautious, evidence-based approach," he added.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel