15 YEARS OF DDN
WHAT A LONG STRA
When DDN launched way back in
2004 Tony Blair was prime minister,
the NTA was just three years old, and
the money was flowing into drug
treatment. Today the sector, and the
country, are very different places
2004 The year starts with cannabis being moved from class B to class C,
a status it would manage to retain for a full five years before yo-yoing back
up again. The government launches its Alcohol harm reduction strategy for
England, which the BMJ quickly dismisses as the ‘dampest of squibs’. Any
government serious about addressing the issue would increase the price, the
journal states – ‘it’s the one measure that will reliably reduce harm.’
2005 In a perhaps naïve attempt to usher in a culture of civilised,
continental-style alcohol consumption, the provisions of the 2003 Licensing
Act come into force, allowing theoretical 24-hour drinking and generating
predictably apocalyptic headlines. The government re-classifies magic
mushrooms to class A, and – not for the last time – Britons are identified as
among Europe’s biggest consumers of cocaine.
2006 The government warns drugs gangs to ‘be afraid’ as it launches
the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), while – in a sign of how much
times have changed – the sector expresses disappointment that this year’s
increase in the Pooled Treatment Budget is ‘only’ 28 per cent rather than the
40 per cent first promised. Scotland’s ban on smoking in public places comes
into force, with England, Wales and Northern Ireland following the next year.
2007 The government begins consulting on its next drug strategy,
pledging to focus on ‘educating the young and protecting the vulnerable’,
while almost 9,000 people fill in the NTA’s user satisfaction survey, with
effective care plans and ‘being treated with respect’ identified as key
6 • DRINK AND DRUGS NEWS • NOVEMBER 2019
positives. The RSA’s Drugs – facing facts report calls for a shift from a criminal
justice to a health-based approach, while the Independent Working Group
on Drug Consumption Rooms recommends that UK pilot schemes be
established – 12 years later not one will have been allowed.
2008 The global financial crisis hits, setting the scene for the
austerity policies that would later see funding for treatment and other
services slashed. The government’s ten-year Drugs: protecting families and
communities strategy launches, with offers of support to people who use
drugs in return for ‘responsibility’. Transform calls it a ‘miserable regurgitation
of past mistakes’ while, depressingly, two thirds of respondents to a MORI
poll believe that people infected with HIV through injecting drug use have
‘only themselves to blame’. The abstinence v harm reduction wars continue,
with Alliance policy officer Peter McDermott branding ‘recovery’ as ‘jargon for
state drugs apparatchiks’. DDN’s first service user conference, Nothing about
us without us, draws 600 delegates – three times the projected number.
2009 The Scottish Government announces its plans for MUP by stating
that ‘strong drink will no longer be sold for pocket money prices’, heralding
the beginnings of a legal battle with the industry that will drag on for the
best part of a decade. Home secretary Alan Johnson sacks ACMD chair David
Nutt for stating that alcohol is more harmful than ecstasy, LSD or cannabis
and, in what will become something of a familiar scenario, the government
also ignores the ACMD’s recommendation to downgrade MDMA to class B.
2006: The
government
warns drugs gangs
to ‘be afraid’ as
it launches the
Serious Organised
Crime Agency
2010 In another soon-to-
be-familiar scenario the EMCDDA
announces that the number of new
drugs reported to it is the biggest ever.
NHS figures show that Scotland’s rate
of chronic liver disease has tripled in
the last 15 years, and the death toll in
the first ever drug-related outbreak of
anthrax – the result of contaminated
heroin – reaches double figures. The
Drug strategy 2010 is published to a
lukewarm response, with DrugScope
questioning how its aims could
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