A fresh look at our approach to drug use

The clamour is growing for a fresh look at our approach to drug use. Rosy Matheson reports

A clean start
A cross-party committee of MPs wants the government to set up a Royal Commission on drugs. David Cameron, the Prime Minister, has rejected the call. The issue has a particular importance to Brighton, often described as Britain’s drugs death capital. So it is unsurprising that Caroline Lucas, the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, wants Mr Cameron to reconsider.

Dr Lucas described the Prime Minister’s reaction as “both disappointing and deeply irresponsible” and said: “I’d urge him to think again and support a full cost-benefit analysis and impact assessment to compare the effectiveness of current drugs policy in reducing the societal, economic and health costs of drug misuse with other approaches.”
She endorses the Home Affairs Select Committee’s demand for a drugs policy review. She wants to see a new approach to the treatment of addiction, recognising that the misuse of drugs is primarily a public health issue rather than a criminal justice one. This view has the support of one former Brighton drug user who likened his addiction to a disease.

Robert (not his real name) is a 36 year old who lives in St James’s Street. He said: “I came from a loving home and had been to private school but I believe that addiction is an illness that’s progressive and will only get worse. I started doing drugs when I was nine. The cool kids at school were taking solvent, glue and gases so I took them too.”

Robert said that he was an addict from a young age and by 15 was dependent on cannabis, amphetamines, ecstasy, cocaine and alcohol. He said: “I developed an obsession about taking drugs and was never sated. It was an overwhelming compulsion.” Robert started stealing to fund his habit but was caught and sent to Feltham Young Offenders Institution for two years. He had just been released when he got into a fight with a man who died from his injuries.

This time Robert was put away for 13 years. Within three months he was using heroin. He said the first time he tried heroin it was “horrendous”. Despite this, he started using it every day. His drug abuse spiralled until one day he had an epiphany. He said: “I had a moment of clarity and saw my life for what it was. I thought, chances were, I would either end up dead or have to stay in prison for the rest of my life.”

Local action
Campaigners believe early intervention rather than criminalisation might avoid such outcomes. And Caroline Lucas agrees with the Home Affairs Select Committee that “the principal aim of government drugs policy should be first and foremost to minimise the damage caused to the victims of drug-related crime, drug users and others”.

The establishment of a Royal Commission has been a longstanding Green Party policy. And according to Dr Lucas, its remit should include looking at whether approaches other than prohibition would be more successful. It should also consider what effect the decriminalisation and regulation of cannabis would have on the trade.

She said that a local drugs commission had already been set up in Brighton and Hove to examine drugs policy and addiction treatment. It was chaired by the crime writer Peter James and took the views of experts and practitioners and explored alternative approaches. Mike Weatherley, the Conservative MP for Hove, also organised a conference on the same subject, which Dr Lucas attended.

It is already on record that Chief Superintendent Graham Bartlett, the Brighton and Hove divisional police commander, favours a new policy. He said: “We have drugs usage which is worse than Liverpool and parts of London, and though drug addiction is properly regarded in the country as a physiological addiction we deal with it as a crime.

“It’s no good arresting street level dealers and putting them in prison for three or four weeks because it is such a lucrative market. There are so many vulnerable people you just get more taking their place.”

A medical view
One expert who lives in Brighton, Jason Heath, has worked with the drug treatment team at Lewes Prison. He said that there was often a link between young people going to prison, having experienced physical or sexual abuse or coming from a broken home, and drug or alcohol dependency. As well as working as a GP in Lewes, Dr Heath also runs a substance misuse clinic once a week. He agreed that there should be more support for people with addiction but he stressed the need for early intervention.

He said: “By the time they come into prison on drugs, a lot of the problems have already begun to be seeded, and we need to start much earlier on – looking at the problems in society that lead to drug use, providing better opportunities to tackle the problems and not just criminalising them.”

It’s hard to break the cycle of drug abuse and currently only about 10 per cent of patients at his drug misuse clinic manage to kick the habit each year. Dr Heath doesn’t think legalisation is necessarily the solution and worries that decriminalising even cannabis could harm vulnerable teenagers.

He said: “The difficulty arises when you’ve got different strengths of cannabis, with different individual susceptibilities to cannabinoids and problems with psychosis, paranoia and mood disturbance at a time which is going to interfere with a youngster’s education and chances in life.”

He believes that while there can be some positives in going to prison, such as testing for blood-borne viruses and a focused approach to managing illness, there is probably a better way. He said: “Prison’s expensive and it’s going to have a major impact to imprison someone as a means to treat their drug problem.”

“It’s a real broken system. It’s flawed and they keep papering over the cracks”

Former addict Robert has been clean for more than two years but said that being in jail didn’t help his recovery. He favours the abstinence-based approach supported by the likes of Andy Winter at Brighton Housing Trust. Robert said: “Prison is no answer. It’s not a deterrent as you are given lots of free drugs and you can spend months in oblivion even in the supposedly drug-free wings. It’s a real broken system. It’s flawed and they keep papering over the cracks.”

Robert has now turned his life around. He is self-employed and planning to get married. He is against legalisation. He said: “I think it’s a nonsense and I don’t see how that helps anyone with an addiction. I tried everything but in the end an abstinence-based programme was the only thing that worked for me.”