Use of the synthetic cannabinoid is soaring in Blackpool, but the town is far from alone

On a grey November day when dark clouds are rolling in from the Irish Sea, even its famous illuminations struggle to dispel the gloom encircling Blackpool.

Five of its neighbourhoods are among the 10 most deprived areas in England, and if the economy is bouncing back to pre-2008 levels in some parts of the UK, it’s not happening in Blackpool. Unemployment is stubbornly high, good jobs scarce, and, to top it all, the coastal town is embroiled in a highly public spat with Jeremy Clarkson, who recently called it a “cesspit of awfulness and disease”.

Now it is grappling with another problem. Spice, the street name for synthetic cannabis, has ravaged homeless communities in some of the UK’s most deprived regions, particularly the north of England and south Wales.

“It’s growing in popularity; it’s horrible to watch,” said Helen Gavaghan, a “navigator” for Blackpool Fulfilling Lives, an organisation that works with some of the town’s most vulnerable people. Although spice, a former legal high, was banned in 2009, the brand name is now used for similar drugs manufactured in China and east Asia that mimic the effects of cannabis and which are sold, often legally, by online retailers and in the UK’s 350 head shops.

“Spice is a generic name for a bewildering range of synthetic compounds that bear no relationship to the cannabis plant except that the chemicals hit the same receptors in the brain that cannabis does,” said Harry Shapiro, a drug information analyst. “When we test the mixtures of [spice] compounds, we find that some of them have been banned and some haven’t. We are seeing some very ill people who have been using synthetic cannabinoids.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A synthetic cannabis user prepares to roll a joint.

A few years ago the homeless in some of Blackpool’s most deprived areas – the town centre, South Shore and Central Drive – would be using alcohol or heroin. Now spice is often their drug. In Blackpool, a gram costs between £5 and £10 – enough, Gavaghan said, “to make 20 spliffs that will get 40 people out of it”.

“It’s popular with people with no money because it’s cheaper, it’s stronger, so a small amount lasts a lot longer,” she said. “Two or three tokes and you’re in oblivion. People on it, they’re not in there any more. They can walk around but their face is flat, they’re not really hearing. Often they’re aggressive. Their empathy has been turned off.”

This experience is not unique to Blackpool. Research by Northumbria University, in Newcastle, has found that legal highs are fuelling a spike in antisocial behaviour and aggressive begging across the north-east of England. Last year in Newcastle alone, more than 1,100 police hours were spent dealing with incidents related to legal highs.

Theresa May's legal highs ban is unenforceable, say government advisers Read more

Across the country, police incidents involving legal highs have more than doubled in two years. Officers from 32 forces in England attended 3,807 incidents in 2014 – up from 1,431 the previous year, according to research by the Centre for Social Justice.

Amid mounting concern, Public Health England issued a national alert to healthcare workers earlier this year, warning of the rising harm from spice, also known as black mamba, the side effects of which include vomiting, seizures, psychosis and, in some cases, death. The drug’s notoriety has seen it enter the lexicon. Users now refer to “mambulances”, due to the large numbers of users being rushed to A&E by paramedics.

In the US its impact on homeless communities is proving devastating, with scores of deaths reported monthly. The American Association of Poison Control Centres reports that visits to emergency rooms across the US caused by spice have risen from 13 in 2009 to 1,500 this April alone.

“People are quite naive about it,” Shapiro said. “When they sprinkle it in a joint, they put the same amount in as if it were cannabis. That’s way over the top.”

Some cities have taken a unilateral approach to combating the problem. Earlier this year, Lincoln became the first city in the UK to ban the use of legal highs. But prohibition is unlikely to deter homeless users. Gavaghan suggested that many use the drug as a coping mechanism to escape childhood trauma or other deep-rooted issues. Often, she said, homelessness and drug dependence feed off each other. “Substance misuse gets worse if someone is homeless. But some find themselves homeless as a result of substance abuse.”

People on it, they're not there any more. They can walk around but their face is flat, they're not really hearing Helen Gavaghan, counsellor

A significant factor is the prevalence of the drug in prisons. As spice does not show up in tests, it has become the drug of choice for many inmates who continue using when they leave prison and are still being tested to comply with their probation terms.

“These substances are cheap, legally available and potent,” said Jeremy Sare, formerly head of drug legislation and classification at the Home Office, now director of government affairs at the Angelus Foundation, a charity set up to campaign against legal highs. He is deeply critical of the way head shops sell the drugs, many of which are labelled “not for human consumption”.

“They accept electrical items [in exchange]; they give credit; they’ll just sell you £2 worth – it’s all feeding addiction. Some operate 24 hours; they have a panel on which you can knock and someone will be there. The head shops are portrayed by some as benign, misunderstood chaps who are not really causing any social problems, just selling low-strength stimulants, but they are reckless in the extreme and are massively exploiting these vulnerable people and causing severe harm.”

The government has pledged to tackle the problem. From April next year it will be a criminal offence to supply and import psychoactive substances, with offenders facing prison sentences of up to seven years. But Homeless Link, whose 500 member organisations have become so concerned about legal highs that they have established a forum to gather evidence on their effects, questions whether this will make much difference to those living on the streets.

“The main source of sale will be transferred from shops to street dealers, where vulnerable people are at most risk of exploitation, abuse and violence,” a spokesman said. “And if, to reduce the risk of harm, vulnerable people then choose to buy through the internet, they are at risk of criminalisation under the proposed bill changes through the importing of drugs.”

There are signs that the market is anticipating the effect prohibition will have on imports. Domestically produced synthetic cannabis, sold in unbranded packs, is starting to make an appearance on Britain’s streets. “There is a lot more homemade product around,” Sare said. “The manufacturing is pretty haphazard.”

Several charities told the Observer that the manufacturers have begun to test their products by using homeless people as guinea pigs.

Britain’s problems with the spice trade are just beginning.