The Cocaine Trade - Home Affairs Committee Contents


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20 - 24)

TUESDAY 9 JUNE 2009

PROFESSOR JOHN STRANG

  Q20  David T C Davies: Do you have any views as to why increasing numbers of people are using cocaine? Is it to do with the price or availability or social changes?

  Professor Strang: In a way what is puzzling is why it occurs in some countries and not others and in some cities to a greater extent than others. Part of that is to do with trade routes; part of it is also to do with price and availability. Beyond that I am struggling, along with the rest of the world.

  Q21  Mr Winnick: Professor, the Chairman asked you at the beginning of the session about any increase in cocaine and apparently, from information which we have, the use of cocaine is now more than four times higher than it was, say, ten years ago. Does that surprise you?

  Professor Strang: It does not surprise me. I was aware of those changing trends. I come back to my earlier response that one has to hold those two sets of data in one's mind simultaneously: the changing prevalence of use, what is occurring with the general population. The British Crime Survey also breaks it down into the adult population as a whole and I frighteningly see that "adult" takes you up to 59, which makes me very nervous now. It separately gives you young people, which is up to 24. You can look at those two different bits and then you separately have lots of people having an impact on the treatment system saying "I'm in a mess, can you help me with it?". You have to be familiar with both of those and to reconcile the two.

  Q22  Mr Winnick: May I put this point to you? Critics of the existing law say it does not simply work any more. I am not necessarily taking the same view. They point to the United States in the 1930s and say "Look what prohibition did for alcohol. It gave every motive for gangsters to make huge profits" and the rest of it. Moreover, if drug dealers had a vote in the House of Commons, they would certainly vote in favour of the existing law. Do you take a view yourself that existing legislation simply is not working and in some respects is even counterproductive?

  Professor Strang: I think you are taking me way outside my area of particular expertise. If I may again say, during the course of your deliberations this drug policy and public good book should come out at the end of the year and has a whole section about how one looks at legislation, legal frameworks and looks at the different case studies around the world of countries which have chosen to vary it. The only point I would add at this stage is that it is not as simple as having prohibition or legalisation. The law may be an ass, but it can sometimes be quite a subtle ass, to quote one of my colleagues. You can look at ways in which you apply the law which may be less draconian than they were, issues about the extent to which severe prison sentences or mild prison sentences or custodial versus non-custodial sentences are different from a binary view that it is either completely legal or completely illegal.

  Q23  Mr Winnick: Could it be argued in favour of the existing position that it might at least deter some people who do not want to break the law, though all the evidence seems to suggest that people would take cocaine and other drugs regardless of any prohibition?

  Professor Strang: There is no question that the illegality of a substance is a major deterrent to its use, whatever different commentators may say. All of the evidence is that that is part of what does have a deterrent effect and one would have to presume that if legal constraints were taken away the level of use would almost certainly increase.

  Q24  Mr Winnick: Do you believe that to be the case?

  Professor Strang: Yes. Certainly we know that with other similar addictive substances like alcohol and tobacco, as you alter constraints, price constraints as well as social constraints, the population level of use goes up and down. I would presume that the same is as true in this marketplace as in those marketplaces.

  Chairman: Professor Strang, thank you very much for your evidence today. It may well be that during the course of our inquiry, which begins today and will go on until October of this year, we may need to write to you about certain information or you may feel it is appropriate to write to us based on some of the evidence that you may hear. We would be very happy to hear from you. We are very grateful to you for coming to give evidence today.





 
previous page contents next page

House of Commons home page Parliament home page House of Lords home page search page enquiries index

© Parliamentary copyright 2010
Prepared 3 March 2010