By Gregor Boyd

For many years now. Scotland’s drug crisis has been widely reported on. According to the National  Record of Statistics in Scotland. The number of deaths has continued to rise. 2021 saw a slight decrease in the number of drugs with 9 less than the year before.

Dundee has been dubbed the drug capital of Europe. With drugs being readily available and even purchasable online. It’s never been easier to find a supply. Despite attempts by police to clamp down on it. The people of Scotland continue to suffer and the impact this causes on local health services that are already struggling. Attempts by campaigners to change the laws surrounding drugs have been met with resistance.

Treating it as a health problem and not a criminal issue is seen by many as the way forward, emulating the approach taken by Portugal. This revolutionary method was adopted as a policy in 2001.  The policy decriminalised all personal possession, consumption and acquisition of drugs. 

This approach removed the criminal nature associated with being caught using drugs. This health-based policy saw benefits with decreases in drug use, drug death and more people seeking treatment, leading to other countries wanting to adopt similar methods due to the popularity of the policy.

Scotland’s attempts to mitigate this crisis have seen campaigns supporting the idea of injecting clinics where users can safely dispose of needles. People in shops are also being trained on reversing opiate overdose with Naloxone kits. Despite the steps put forward by the Scottish govt on proposed Injecting clinics, this has been knocked back by the UK government. A working solution in countries such as Denmark and Canada is to keep needles off of streets, prevent unnecessary drug deaths and mitigate some of the dangers users may face when trying to inject.

The problems facing Scotland’s drug population were also exacerbated due to the Covid-19 pandemic as places took steps to mitigate the spread of the virus. The isolation people had to undertake made things harder for many addicts who might have depended on social interactions or in-person meetings.

The Minister for Drug Policy Angela Constance has been in touch with the newly appointed Conservative MP Jeremy Quin, Minister of State for Crime, Policing and Fire in an attempt to collectively work to address and tackle drug use across the United Kingdom.  The UK government’s hardline approach to the drug policy published earlier this year appears to be a 3 tier structure starting with Fixed Penalty notices moving upwards in severity to mandatory drug testing and awareness courses and finally, formal court proceedings resulting in potential confiscation of Passport/Driving Licence.