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Mr. Flynn: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Spring: No, not at this stage--I shall give way later. Despite some of the sensible observations of the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey, I thought that there was a bit of parliamentary snake oil activity on his part. We know that the Liberal Democrats effectively called for the decriminalisation of cannabis at their 1994 conference. They came out with this fudge--they did not know what to do, so they talked about a royal commission. It has now moved along because of the effect of the national strategy and it is now supposedly a more all-encompassing agency. It is a fudge, and all hon. Members recognise it for what it is.
I refer to criminality. The Department of Health task force review on services to drug misusers pointed out that the 1,110 drug misusers included in the national treatment outcome research study committed 70,000 crimes, costing victims £34 million, in the two years before they had treatment--that is five crimes per person per week. We have heard that something like 70 per cent. of youth crime is directly or indirectly linked to drugs.
Even if we put aside the health and moral issues surrounding drugs, we can see that their impact on society includes attacks on people and an upsurge in burglary. A free national helpline was set up and it received 192,755 calls in its first year--that underlines the concern of parents and others in the community about drugs.
My personal odyssey in learning about drugs misuse started in my constituency only a few months after I became a Member of Parliament. I was approached by the general practitioners in Newmarket who were concerned about drugs misuse, particularly that of amphetamines. They felt that the key elements of the local community were not working together effectively--they included the police, social services, the probation service, general practitioners and others. They felt that I, as a Member of Parliament, could play some sort of role.
I created a drugs task force in Newmarket. What has happened since the evolution of the drugs task force is interesting. We have sought to prevent drugs misuse in part by taking on three youth outreach workers who go into the town at night to talk to young people about any subject, including their problems. I have accompanied those outreach workers, who are an impressive group of people. They are extremely approachable.
To answer the point raised by the hon. Member for Newport, West, of course we cannot measure the effect in that small community of having those three youth outreach workers in terms of preventing people from taking drugs, but it certainly seems to be a sensible way of handling the problem. All the feedback that I have heard from the outreach workers suggests that young people with real problems find them approachable and can talk to them. As a result, some may have decided not to get involved in drugs.
Sadly, however, drugs misuse continues to grow. Despite some important and helpful moves in the Newmarket community, there has been a growing incidence of heroin addiction. A similar task force has been set up in the main town in my constituency, Bury St. Edmunds. How we can imaginatively address the interests of young people in trying to lead their lives without experimenting with drugs is a source of great concern. We have decided to have a drugs awareness week, including a drugs-free rave. Having written to the local branches of Tesco and Marks and Spencer, I would like to thank them for the money that they have donated to enable us to go ahead with our drugs awareness week. I hope and believe that it will be successful.
The two drugs task forces, assisted by the two district councils, jointly employ a substance misuse training officer who talks to parents, teachers, clubs and societies about the dangers of drugs, the warning signs and all the help that is increasingly available because of the strategy that my right hon. Friend unveiled last year.
I believe that the local community effort in my constituency is strong. Of course it is at the heart of our national strategy--working through local communities and adapting to their needs.
As my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House said, the 105th drug action team reported on 31 December and each plan of action has been adjusted to different circumstances. In my constituency, under the leadership of the Suffolk health authority and its chairman, Joanna Spicer, we now have a manager to examine drugs-related issues and the overall commitment for the county of Suffolk. He came from East Sussex Drugs Advisory Council in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Mr. Rathbone), which is a great role model for the rest of the country, and we are lucky to have him in place. He discovered that the three service agencies in the county were barely talking to each other.
There was no hostility, but because they were in different geographical locations, they were not co-operating effectively.
We are trying to make sure that services are co-ordinated and that joint functioning of the strategy works effectively right across the board, so that local arrangements reflect the national strategy. We certainly do not want a glorified national strategy that does not operate at grass-roots level.
What is happening in my area is clearly occurring across the country: existing groups are co-operating for the good of those who are affected by the drugs problem. I am pleased to see that the groups involved in the areas of drugs prevention, rehabilitation and enforcement in Suffolk are working together closely.
Mr. Flynn:
Does advice include persuading young people not to drink the high-alcohol cordial products that are now available? How will the hon. Gentleman measure the success of those schemes?
Mr. Spring:
The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting point which was drawn to my attention by the youth outreach workers to whom I referred. I accept that there is a link between alcohol and drugs misuse. I accept also that in many parts of the country alcohol abuse is probably a more significant problem than drug abuse. While not wishing to minimise the dangers of alcohol, I stress that today we are discussing the drugs issue and the horrific impact that drugs can have on people's lives.
If a constabulary decides to conduct an anti-drugs operation and carries out raids on houses or pubs, that may have an effect on the prescribed, legal drug supply. If the supply of illegal drugs dries up, those who were addicts or near addicts may go to national health service organisations to obtain drugs legally. By working with the police, those services will know about police activity in advance and thus be ready to deal with the consequences. That did not occur previously. The drugs strategy is important as it tries to persuade people to work together, under the aegis of drugs action teams, in the areas of prevention, rehabilitation and enforcement.
I stress another important aspect of the strategy and I refer again to my experience in Suffolk. I pay tribute to Robin and Lilias Sheepshanks who founded ADFAM (Suffolk) in 1987. They have worked extremely hard to build up that charity through their commitment to young people. They support drug addicts and their families, they offer drugs and bereavement counselling and provide training and education. Their task has been all the more difficult as they have sought funding largely through donations. I hope that organisations such as that will increasingly come under the umbrella of the overall drugs strategy.
We should never forget that drug users have families. Anguished parents do not know what to do: they often cannot accept that their children take drugs and they then suffer the guilt and the concern that follow that realisation. It is crucial to provide support for those families, and that is what is happening in Suffolk.
Drugs destroy lives. It is absurd to make a distinction, as some would, between so-called "soft" drugs and "hard" drugs. As I said before, powerful variants of cannabis
have been produced that can cause hallucinations and lead to psychiatric disorders and suicide. Therefore, it is vital from a health point of view that we prevent young people from taking drugs in the first place. All the evidence--particularly from the United States--points to the fact that, although people may try hard to rehabilitate addicts, the success rate is not high. Therefore, prevention is at the heart of the matter.
I hope that more random testing will take place in the private sector. It is already becoming a feature of life in this country--it is certainly happening in the United States--that employers are unwilling to take people on if they are shown to be taking drugs. Nothing would be a greater incentive to young people leaving university to know that their future careers may be put in jeopardy if a test shows that they are involved in taking drugs. I hope that random testing increasingly becomes part and parcel of the private sector's way of doing things.
What has been set in place is absolutely crucial for the future stability of our society. Drugs have become a real cancer in our midst. We are genuinely seeking a strategy based on local community partnerships, on prevention, rehabilitation and enforcement, working together to find a way through.
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