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David Liddell believes there is now a political consensus in Scotland for decriminalising drug possession.

The chief executive of the Scottish Drugs Forum has dedicated his life to reducing the harms inflicted by drugs on Scottish society.

Liddell won respect for helping implement needle exchanges and methadone programmes at a time when Scotland was in the midst of a heroin and HIV crisis in the 80s.

But he has witnessed a disastrous breakdown in process between research, policy and treatment in Scotland in the last 10 years – plunging our nation into a mire where more people die from drugs than in any other country in the EU.

The views expressed in the Record today reflect a frustration over barriers he believes Scotland faces

to taking truly radical steps to stem the growing tide of deaths, which are set to top 1000 this year for the first time ever.

Liddell has held the view for years that drugs should be treated as a health issue, rather than a crime issue. He believes stigma is indirectly killing people - with negative views towards addicts blocking initiatives that could turn their lives around.

Here, Liddell argues that the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act is outdated and must be overhauled.

He believes that decriminalising possession of all drugs and bringing in drug consumption rooms for addicts will make a difference.

And he believes Police Scotland should be instructed to use warnings for minor possession offences, rather than burden individuals and the state with an administrative process and criminal record

to follow.

Liddell asks why 60 per cent of people in England with a drug problem are in treatment while the figure in Scotland is 40 per cent. He also questions why Scots suffer longer waiting times for prescriptions that might save their lives.

Liddell seeks answers on how Scotland makes little use of the opiate replacement buprenorphine, despite many studies suggesting it could offer benefits over methadone for long-term patients.

The drug situation in Scotland is now a national concern. The toll of suffering and death appals us all.

We need a comprehensive range of responses to our drug problem. There is no magic silver bullet. There are some tough questions to face.

Decriminalising possession, drug checking and proposed drug consumption rooms would all help make a difference.

There has been a lot of comment on the mess of current UK laws. They are confused. They neither reflect nor deal with the harms drugs cause. In fact, they may even cause harm.

The main law, the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act, reflects the issues we faced in the 60s. In truth, it wasn’t very good even then.

There is evidence and even a growing consensus that we should decriminalise the possession of drugs for personal use. Devolving these laws would allow Scotland to do this.

However, the issue is partly about how we police the law. There has been some progress towards decriminalisation already.

In Scotland, police now use Registered Police Warnings for cases of possession of cannabis for personal use. That is sensible and fair and better than burdening people with the threat of court and a criminal record that just affects their chance of getting a job in the future.

But why not do this with other drugs with the same illegal status? In parts of England, under the same UK law, policing has changed in this way. Why not here, in Scotland?

At festivals and other events in England, people can have samples of drugs checked using chemical testing. They find out how strong they are and if they contain other, more dangerous, drugs – a cause of harms and some deaths.

In Wales, the Government and NHS set up a national drug checking service years ago.

Under the same UK law, this had not happened in Scotland.

Why is that? What can we do about that?

We face many issues. But there should not be any big dilemmas. The evidence about what should be done is clear. We need to follow that evidence.

The vast majority of deaths involve opiates like heroin. The evidence shows that the best way to protect people with a drug problem from death is being in treatment.

We have to ask ourselves why 60 per cent of people with a drug problem in England are in treatment, while in Scotland that figure is just 40 per cent. But it is not just about being in treatment – it is about people getting the treatment that they need and that suits them.

We have to ask why in England people with a heroin problem are far more likely to be on buprenorphine – an alternative to methadone which benefits some patients – than they are in Scotland.

Why is that and what can we learn from that?

In Scotland, as many as a half of the patients on methadone or buprenorphine are on doses lower than the bare minimum recommended by the World Health Organisation and in clinical guidelines. Why is that?

The Scottish Government set a target for people to receive treatment within three weeks. That was good as a first step.

But why, in some areas, are people waiting up to six months for a prescription for medication they desperately need?

The answers lie with us all. There has been a reluctance to face facts and accept the evidence at all levels, including among the public.

We have stigmatised not only drug use but people with drug problems. We have also stigmatised the

treatment that would save them. People in our communities are dying because of this stigma.

The size of the problem and the level of public and political concern are obvious.

Scotland needs to change its attitude and decide to act on these issues. We need to raise our expectations and our aspirations as a country.

We can look to the evidence from across Europe. There are answers.

There is hope but we need to act, we need to act differently and we need to act now.

Right now, there is a lot of attention on this issue. We have a newly published Government drug strategy and an ongoing inquiry by a Westminster committee.

In addition, the Scottish Public Health Minister has announced he will set up an expert group.

We have to hope that all this attention helps Scotland deal with its drug problem.

Someone once described politics as the art of the possible – we must do what is possible under

existing law.

If UK laws allow us to follow the evidence and reduce drug harms, including drug deaths, we should

do so now. If UK laws obstruct us from following the evidence, we should seek devolution.