House of Commons
Friday 21 June 1996
The House met at half-past Nine o'clock
PRAYERS
[Madam Speaker in the Chair]
Drugs Strategy
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Newton.]
9.34 am
The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Tony Newton): I welcome this opportunity to open a full day's debate on the Government's strategy against drugs. It is almost exactly a year ago--on 9 June 1995--when hon. Members last had a chance to assess progress in tackling drug misuse. That debate provided a considerable number of thoughtful and informative contributions and I look forward to a similarly constructive discussion on this occasion.
No one present this morning and no one who is a parent or who has concerns about the dangers facing our young people can fail to reflect on the serious problems of drug misuse--and not just in this country, although they are certainly serious enough here.
I can give some facts by way of illustration. The total street value of seizures of illegal drugs in 1995 was £457 million, 5 per cent. up on the previous year; the number of drug offenders was 87,000, 25 per cent. up; the number of notified addicts was 34,000, 21 per cent. up; and, the number of newly notified addicts was 13,500, an increase of 17 per cent. One study found that 664 drug misusers, before treatment, committed more than 70,000 crimes over a three-month period. The just published 1994 "British Crime Survey" showed that more than four in 10 of 16 to 29-year-olds said that they had taken an illegal drug, although--an important balancing factor--only 14 per cent. had taken one in the previous month.
Surveys regularly show that drugs and drug-related violent crime are high among public concerns at all levels of society and that our young people--in rural areas just as much as in towns and cities--feel consistently pressurised by what is sometimes described as the drug culture. Even though those figures are disturbing, it is important not to respond to them with despair or with a sense that nothing can be done. It remains the case that drug misuse among young people is not, and I stress that word, a routine "rite of passage"--the phrase sometimes used. Less than a quarter of our young people have taken a prohibited drug in the past year and it is still the case that more than half of our youngsters never take an illegal drug.
Cannabis is easily the most dominant drug of misuse, with just 6 per cent. of our young people ever having taken Ecstasy, 3 per cent. cocaine, 1 per cent. heroin and less than 1 per cent. crack. In acknowledging the problem,
we must be careful not to exaggerate it and be unnecessarily defeatist. Nevertheless, we face a major challenge in tackling a problem that causes harm, destruction to families and communities and ultimately, and of course most tragically, deaths; there were nearly 2,500 drug-related deaths in England and Wales in 1994.
Mr. Paul Flynn (Newport, West):
I apologise for interrupting the right hon. Gentleman at such an early stage, but I am confused by what he is saying. He has used the expression "illegal drugs" about four times and "drugs" eight times. A particular drug is involved in 40 per cent. of all crimes of violence and of abuse--a drug called alcohol. It is important to differentiate between illegal drugs and drugs, but many of us want to talk about the drugs of massive abuse, which are tobacco, alcohol and some medicinal drugs. The Leader of the House should make it clear to which drugs he is referring.
Mr. Newton:
I think that I have made it pretty clear that I am talking about drugs in the sense in which the word is conventionally used--I have just listed a number of them--but that is not to dismiss concerns about alcohol problems, for example. I am sure that if the hon. Gentleman catches your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker, he will want to develop further the point that he just implied. The Government have a range of policies designed to address alcohol misuse. Several drug action teams, to which I shall refer later, embrace programmes against alcohol abuse alongside their programmes against drug abuse in the sense in which I am using the term. I do not dismiss concerns about alcohol, but my speech today is focused on drugs in the sense of the chemical substances that I mentioned.
The Government have been pursuing a vigorous response to the problems that I have outlined. I am speaking today because I have the task of chairing the Cabinet Sub-Committee on Drug Misuse and, through it, of overseeing the development of strategies for tackling drugs across the United Kingdom. With the active support of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment, my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary, and my right hon. Friend the Paymaster General, who is responsible for Customs and Excise, I have been particularly concerned with developing a strategy for England, "Tackling Drugs Together", which I presented to the House, in the form of a White Paper, in May 1995.
At the core of the strategy is tough law enforcement, accessible treatment and effective education and prevention. All three are important. We aim to make communities safe from drug-related crime; to cut the acceptability and availability of drugs to young people; and to reduce the health risks of drug misuse. Significant resources are available year on year to do that--more than £500 million--and additional resources are being provided as and when necessary, such as an extra £34 million for 1996-97 for new education training projects, publicity, drug treatment services, and treatment and control programmes in the Prison Service.
The strategy's progress is dependent on partnerships at national level and on partnerships between local agencies and their wider communities, especially with the new drug action teams that have been established across England.
I want therefore to report primarily on the achievements of the first year of the strategy and to look forward to some of the tasks ahead.
First, I should refer to the significant developments in other parts of the UK. Under the leadership of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland, the Scotland Against Drugs campaign was set firmly under way last month. It was set up with all-party support, which I hope all such campaigns enjoy and will continue to enjoy, and is making a substantial impact on public confidence and support north of the border.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales last month established a new drug and alcohol strategy for Wales, with a new unit managing it.
Mr. Flynn:
I am sorry to interrupt--I promise that this will be the last time--but the right hon. Gentleman mentioned Wales. In its campaign against drugs, why did the Welsh Office decide a month ago to cut the funding of Alcohol Action Wales, a body that has done tremendous work in co-ordinating the hundreds of people who are working to reduce the problems caused by alcohol abuse? Are not the Government concentrating on illegal drugs and neglecting the harm done by drugs that are legal?
Mr. Newton:
That is a rerun of the hon. Gentleman's first intervention. The fact is that the Government take all those problems seriously, but there are different strands, and there are different approaches to tackling problems in different parts of the United Kingdom, as is considered appropriate to the circumstances in each case.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Westminster, North (Sir J. Wheeler), is spearheading a partnership strategy in Northern Ireland. In each case, the strategies are being pursued with every effort to secure all-party support. I pay tribute to the approach that the hon. Member for Knowsley, North (Mr. Howarth) has consistently adopted. Our approach is eliciting widespread support across the community.
Such breadth of support is vital to our efforts everywhere, not least in England. That is reflected by the fact that the Prime Minister himself led the event to mark the first anniversary of the drug strategy last month at the Royal National theatre. Many hon. Members have contributed to that support, not least my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Mr. Rathbone), who continues to do such an excellent job as chairman of the all-party group on drug misuse. He has not been able to attend the start of the debate, but I know that he hopes to join us later and I hope that he will be able to contribute.
The strategy is increasingly mobilising a wide range of agencies and individuals who have demonstrated their commitment to the partnership against drugs. I especially acknowledge the expert advice that the Government receive from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which only last week produced another excellent report, this time on drug misusers and the prison system, with the self-explanatory title of an "Integrated Approach". The report, which the Government have welcomed, sets out in clear detail how the Prison Service should consider taking forward its responsibilities.
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