Psychoactive Substances Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2015-06-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Michael Bates (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, this has been a debate of characteristic quality in your Lordships’ House. Immense expertise from around the House has been brought to bear on this issue—by people who have actually devoted their lives to trying to understand and tackle this issue of drugs. I was very struck by the words of my noble friend Lord Mancroft, who talked about the common approach shared by all sides of the argument about seeking to protect our children and the community from the effects of these harmful substances. In that we are united. How we go about that will be a matter of some debate as the Bill moves into Committee, should your Lordships choose to grant it a Second Reading, and the Government will welcome that Your Lordships’ expertise has raised some very thoughtful points. I summarise them as falling into two broad categories: those that look at the particular issue of psychoactive substances and those that relate to wider drugs policy. The noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, touched on that when he said that effectively there were two debates going on here. The all-party group has done some excellent research and taken great evidence—I read its report and recommendations very carefully before this debate, as your Lordships would expect—and I think it is almost quorate in this debate, with the noble Lords, Lord Rea and Lord Howarth, my noble friend Lord Mancroft and the noble Baronesses, Lady Hamwee and Lady Meacher, all present and all making points Another view points to the growing threat of these new psychoactive substances. The early warning system in the European Union—among our European friends, with whom we are working closely on these issues— identified 24 new substances in 2009; in 2010 there were 41; in 2011, 49; in 2012, 74; and in 2013, 81. We are on an exponential rise in the number of these new substances. As my noble friend Lady Browning made clear, this amounts to playing Russian roulette I found one of the most telling contributions to be that of the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, because he came at it from the perspective of pharmacology. I hope that does not impinge on his street cred among his colleagues. He talked about the challenges of dosage and of manufacturing these compounds. Things are coming into this country and being identified at the moment which people are consuming when they have absolutely no understanding of how they have been produced or what is being put before them. People are looking at that and saying, similarly to my noble friend Lord Farmer, who talked about families, that things must be done. That approach is not lacking in intellect There is a growing number of substances so, effectively, we have a choice before us. Do we go down a route where we have base legislation in the Misuse of Drugs Act and then the Government come forward with 500 individual measures and temporary banning orders on banned substances, but their manufacture is unshown? It is almost like a Whac-A-Mole game in the arcade; once one is stopped, another pops up somewhere else. Or do we go down the route of a blanket ban? I know that that is not supported in many of the contributions that were put here, but let me offer some of the places where it is supported The Home Affairs Select Committee took a lot of evidence, and a lot of the people who gave evidence to it also gave evidence to the all-party group on the misuse of drugs. The Select Committee said in its summary, first, that: "We conclude that there is currently an epidemic of psychoactive substances and it is highly likely that the creation of new psychoactive substances will continue to increase in the future unless immediate action is taken" It went on to recommend that, "new legislation, brought in to address the problem of ‘legal highs’, is specific and focused. The law must ensure that the police and law enforcement agencies can take action comprehensively against those who sell new psychoactive substances and remove the reliance on existing legislation which is ill-suited to comprehensively tackling this problem. The legislation needs to allow sellers of new psychoactive substances to be prosecuted for an offence which is equivalent in sanction to that of the Misuse of Drugs Act" In addition to the Home Affairs Select Committee, support comes from: the expert panel appointed by Norman Baker, as was mentioned; the similar panel appointed by the Scottish Government to look into this, which came to the same conclusion; the Health and Social Care Committee of the National Assembly for Wales; several countries, including Ireland and New Zealand, which were mentioned; and each of the main political parties in England and Wales at the election. I am simply saying that it is not an inconsequential body of opinion and we are, rightly, trying to follow the evidence in legislation. I suggest that even if it is not compelling in some areas, that is quite a comprehensive body of evidence I want to address some of the specific issues raised.