Nicola Sturgeon has demanded that Scotland is granted the power to deal with its own drugs crisis.
The First Minister has again admitted we face a national drugs emergency, as the annual death rate approaches 1000 for the year, the worst in Europe.
She said it is “unconscionable” that the UK Government will not permit a safe consumption facility to be set up in Glasgow – which the Home Office has refused on the grounds that users and professionals would be in possession of drugs, which is a criminal act.
Demand to declare public health emergency to tackle Scotland's drug crisis
The First Minister was speaking after drugs expert Dr Andrew McAuley, from Glasgow Caledonian University, told the Scottish affairs committee at Westminster that the case for a drug consumption room in the city is “arguably the most compelling Europe has seen”.
The Daily Record’s substantial focus on drugs in recent months has heard several experts call for the decriminalisation of the use and possession of all drugs.
The Scottish Government’s health minister Joe FitzPatrick recently demanded in the Record that the UK Government passes down power for Scotland to implement radical schemes such as drug consumption rooms. This would make some form of decriminalisation of drug use inevitable.
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At the Scottish affairs committee’s inquiry into the Scottish drug deaths at Westminster on Tuesday, four expert witnesses spoke in favour of such measures.
Dr McAuley told MPs: “The HIV outbreak, drug death epidemic, largest botulism outbreak Europe has ever seen – there’s a whole host of reasons why Glasgow is a perfect case for the UK’s first consumption room.”
Despite such a facility being supported by the Scottish Government and Glasgow City Council, the Home Office has blocked the move.
Speaking during First Minister’s Questions at Holyrood, Sturgeon called on the UK Government to devolve the necessary powers to the Scottish Parliament
There were 934 drug deaths in Scotland in 2017, with the rate of fatalities 2.5 times higher than elsewhere in the UK.
