London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Jul 23, 2025

You’ll never have a drug-free society, expert warns UK

You’ll never have a drug-free society, expert warns UK

Consortium on drugs policy blasts Home Office for approach to tackling narcotic abuse

The Home Office should climb off its “high horse of oppression and prohibition” and stop pursuing the “fantasy” of a drug-free society, the chair of an influential international consortium on drug policy has said.

As a new global index is set to rank each country’s approach to tackling narcotics, former New Zealand prime minister and chair of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, Helen Clark, said that the UK was fixated with a “self-defeating” strategy to the issue that bred misery.

Clark also said that the Home Office’s approach to drug policy meant it deterred police and crime commissioners in England and Wales who might otherwise advocate for a more liberal strategy.

“The Home Office is a major problem. It’s not thinking outside the box. In the UK, you have crime commissioners and there’s more scope for discretion at the local level with some prepared to push the boundary,” Clark told the Observer.

“But to get that consistently across the United Kingdom, you need the Home Office to get off its high horse of oppression and prohibition and say: ‘Look, we’ve had this wrong, our prisons are thronged with people on drug offences, marginalised swathes of people. It’s costly and self-defeating,” added Clark, whose commission is made up largely of world leaders.

By contrast, she praised Scotland for recognising it had problems – the country has the highest per capita number of deaths relating to drug use in Europe – and signalling that it wanted to look for new solutions.

“Scotland knows it’s shameful. After the last set of [fatality] figures came out, the Scottish government wants to [make a] move,” said Clark.

Her comments come just before the inaugural edition of the global drug policy index which ranks countries according to indicators such as health and harm reduction rather than the traditional law enforcement measures of the numbers of arrests or amount of drugs seized.

Helen Clark, former prime minister of New Zealand and chair of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, has told the UK it must change its approach to drug abuse.


According to the latest National Crime Agency annual report, more than 150 tonnes of drugs were seized at a time when deaths from drug poisoning in England and Wales have hit a record high, prompting charities to warn of a public health emergency.
Advertisement

The index, headed by the International Drug Policy Consortium, a global network of 192 organisations, is intended to question the ambition of achieving a “drug-free society”, which Clark says is futile.

“It’s a fantasy, the total elimination of drugs? Dream on, there’s never been a time in human history where human beings haven’t resorted to some kind of substances that will take them out of their current reality for whatever reason,” she said.

The index arrives 50 years after the UK’s Misuse of Drugs Act came into force, which still forms the basis of its anti-drug strategy – separating illicit substances into classes which carry different penalties – but which is facing increasing calls for reform.

A number of prominent campaigners are pushing for the decriminalisation and regulation of drugs with more than 60 MPs supporting a campaign to review current legislation.

Despite this, the UK is expected to sit in the top 10 of the index’s most progressive countries when it is launched in London on Monday, a ranking that Clark says articulates the current failures of global drug policy.

The index is composed of 75 indicators including criminal justice and extreme responses of the state to the issue. Of the 30 countries featured in its first iteration, eight had decriminalised drug use and just three managed to divert people away from the criminal justice system.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Drugs damage communities and ruin lives. We must prevent drug use in our communities, support people through treatment and recovery, and tackle the supply of illegal drugs.”

They cited Project ADDER, which it said was “taking a wide-ranging and integrated approach to prevent drug use and support people dependent on drugs through treatment and recovery”.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
US Treasury Secretary Calls for Institutional Review of Federal Reserve Amid AI‑Driven Growth Expectations
UK Government Considers Dropping Demand for Apple Encryption Backdoor
Severe Flooding in South Korea Claims Lives Amid Ongoing Rescue Operations
Japanese Man Discovers Family Connection Through DNA Testing After Decades of Separation
Russia Signals Openness to Ukraine Peace Talks Amid Escalating Drone Warfare
Switzerland Implements Ban on Mammography Screening
Japanese Prime Minister Vows to Stay After Coalition Loses Upper House Majority
Pogacar Extends Dominance with Stage Fifteen Triumph at Tour de France
CEO Resigns Amid Controversy Over Relationship with HR Executive
Man Dies After Being Pulled Into MRI Machine Due to Metal Chain in New York Clinic
NVIDIA Achieves $4 Trillion Valuation Amid AI Demand
US Revokes Visas of Brazilian Corrupted Judges Amid Fake Bolsonaro Investigation
U.S. Congress Approves Rescissions Act Cutting Federal Funding for NPR and PBS
North Korea Restricts Foreign Tourist Access to New Seaside Resort
Brazil's Supreme Court Imposes Radical Restrictions on Former President Bolsonaro
Centrist Criticism of von der Leyen Resurfaces as she Survives EU Confidence Vote
Judge Criticizes DOJ Over Secrecy in Dropping Charges Against Gang Leader
Apple Closes $16.5 Billion Tax Dispute With Ireland
Von der Leyen Faces Setback Over €2 Trillion EU Budget Proposal
UK and Germany Collaborate on Global Military Equipment Sales
Trump Plans Over 10% Tariffs on African and Caribbean Nations
Flying Taxi CEO Reclaims Billionaire Status After Stock Surge
Epstein Files Deepen Republican Party Divide
Zuckerberg Faces $8 Billion Privacy Lawsuit From Meta Shareholders
FIFA Pressured to Rethink World Cup Calendar Due to Climate Change
SpaceX Nears $400 Billion Valuation With New Share Sale
Microsoft, US Lab to Use AI for Faster Nuclear Plant Licensing
Trump Walks Back Talk of Firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell
Zelensky Reshuffles Cabinet to Win Support at Home and in Washington
"Can You Hit Moscow?" Trump Asked Zelensky To Make Putin "Feel The Pain"
Irish Tech Worker Detained 100 days by US Authorities for Overstaying Visa
Dimon Warns on Fed Independence as Trump Administration Eyes Powell’s Succession
Church of England Removes 1991 Sexuality Guidelines from Clergy Selection
Superman Franchise Achieves Success with Latest Release
Hungary's Viktor Orban Rejects Agreements on Illegal Migration
Jeff Bezos Considers Purchasing Condé Nast as a Wedding Gift
Ghislaine Maxwell Says She’s Ready to Testify Before Congress on Epstein’s Criminal Empire
Bal des Pompiers: A Celebration of Community and Firefighter Culture in France
FBI Chief Kash Patel Denies Resignation Speculations Amid Epstein List Controversy
Air India Pilot’s Mental Health Records Under Scrutiny
Google Secures Windsurf AI Coding Team in $2.4 Billion Licence Deal
Jamie Dimon Warns Europe Is Losing Global Competitiveness and Flags Market Complacency
South African Police Minister Suspended Amid Organised Crime Allegations
Nvidia CEO Claims Chinese Military Reluctance to Use US AI Technology
Hong Kong Advances Digital Asset Strategy to Address Economic Challenges
Australia Rules Out Pre‑commitment of Troops, Reinforces Defence Posture Amid US‑China Tensions
Martha Wells Says Humanity Still Far from True Artificial Intelligence
Nvidia Becomes World’s First Four‑Trillion‑Dollar Company Amid AI Boom
U.S. Resumes Deportations to Third Countries After Supreme Court Ruling
Excavation Begins at Site of Mass Grave for Children at Former Irish Institution
×