The 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act has needlessly criminalised thousands of people, and done nothing to tackle abuse
A pandemic is gripping Europe with its centre in Great Britain. More than 3 million Britons caught it in 2019-20, of whom 5,657 died – a number that has quadrupled since 2013. Scotland’s death rate has soared to three and a half times that of the whole UK, and is the worst in Europe. Multiple cures are being tested round the world, but the British government opposes every one of them.
This year is the 50th anniversary of Westminster telling the world that its Misuse of Drugs Act (1971) would stamp out illegal drugs for ever. The act failed utterly, but it has never been repealed. Among other horrors, the industry it created now enslaves an estimated 27,000 children and teenagers, some as young as eight, in “county lines” drug gangs. The government has no answer but to throw a few of them in jail.
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