DRIVE OUT THE DEMONS

From Pulp Fiction to hard fact, the drug culture is no longer something
that exists only in the margins of Scottish society. Drugs permeate the
world we live in; they refuse to be ignored or sidelined into consoling
stereotypes. It's not just Premiership footballers and wayward rock stars,
but an 11-year-old Glasgow boy, found with #500 of heroin in his schoolbag.
Drugs are rife not just in our inner-city estates but in the rural
North-east, where a large proportion of heroin overdoses involve working
fishermen.

These headlines are familiar, and it is a testimony to the sheer scale of
the anti-drug campaign that drug abuse is now widely recognised as one of
the most pervasive and damaging social problems afflicting Scotland today.
In one recent survey, people cited drugs above health and housing as the
second most important issue affecting Scottish communities after
unemployment. What concerned me was that alcohol abuse didn't even get a
mention.

Drugs may be increasingly prevalent in Scottish society, but alcohol is
part of the very fabric of our everyday lives. While drugs are still taboo
in most circles, alcohol is almost universally accepted as a natural and
necessary feature of any social occasion. In Scotland, alcohol is an
integral part of our culture, our heritage, our religion. It is a drug of
contradictions: a stimulant yet a tranquilliser, a celebrant, a medicine, a
social lubricant, and a religious symbol.

Most of the 90% of adults who drink alcohol do so without causing harm to
anyone else. But behind the Dr Jekyll lurks a demonic Mr Hyde. Alcohol is
an addictive, behaviour-altering drug which acts as a trigger for risky
behaviour of all sorts, from drink-driving to unprotected sex to violence.
The demon drink is present alongside almost every social problem facing
modern Scotland, from homelessness, to unemployment, family break-up,
domestic violence, child abuse, crime and disorder, and urban degeneration.

For every shocking drugs headline there are a hundred stories involving
alcohol. Some are well-documented, from Liam Gallagher's exploits on a
cross- Channel ferry to Samantha Fox's drink-driving. The deeply ambivalent
nature of society's favourite drug is encapsulated perfectly in the
tragi-comic figure of Gazza, the likely lad-next-door, and his very public
struggle with alcoholism. But most of these human tragedies never make the
headlines. They are hidden away in the sheriff court pages of local papers,
in social work files, in doctor's records. Alcohol abuse, in all its shapes
and forms, is such a familiar part of our lives we have almost forgotten to
notice it. While we weren't looking, this very personal addiction has
become a national affliction.

It is often said that admitting the addiction is the first step to breaking
it. Like a first-time attender at an AA meeting, Scotland as a nation needs
to recognise that it has a serious and deeply-damaging alcohol problem. To
appreciate the scale of the problem, compare the relative harm caused by
drink and drugs in Scotland. The statistics are sobering. Drug-related
deaths account for less than a fiftieth of fatalities attributable to
alcohol abuse. One-third of Accident and Emergency admissions have been
drinking, and one-quarter of all men admitted to hospital are problem
drinkers. Alcohol accounts for over one-third of deaths in fires and
one-quarter of all deaths by drowning. In 1996, sustained alcohol abuse was
directly responsible for more than 700 deaths in Scotland. To put it in
perspective: six people died as a result of taking ecstasy in the same year.

These figures only hint at the scale of the problem. Police estimate that
alcohol is a factor in half of all incidents of crime, one-third of child
abuse cases, and 40% of domestic violence attacks. The economic cost of
alcohol abuse is equally staggering. It costs British industry some #2000m
a year, and eight million working days are lost through drink-related
absenteeism. Little wonder our companies struggle to maintain the
productivity levels of their European counterparts. And given the pressure
on the NHS, it's worth bearing in mind that the money spent in Scotland on
in-patient alcohol treatment would pay for many hundreds of extra nurses.

I'm not a killjoy. I'll enjoy my nip this new year as much as the next
person. But Scotland as a nation must confront the unacceptable face of
alcohol with the same vigour and energy that has characterised the
anti-drugs campaign.

The establishment of the Scottish Parliament is a real opportunity to
reappraise our strategy for tackling alcohol and drug abuse in Scotland. I
believe this must begin with an honest examination of our priorities.
Current Government spending commitments tell us more about public
perceptions of the problems than actual social need. While the Government
spends more than #50m a year in Scotland on anti-drugs activities, the
brunt of the cost of the battle against alcohol is being met by charity
organisations. In many parts of Scotland the only targets for social work
referrals are the volunteer alcohol counsellors supplied by the Scottish
Council on Alcohol through its national network of local councils. This
year the Scottish Office gave the SCA an annual grant of just #25,000 to
run its national training scheme for volunteer counsellors. This represents
a 20% cut, in cash terms, since 1980. The scheme actually costs #197,000,
so the shortfall has to be met through SCA fund-raising. In other words,
the provision of key alcohol treatment services in Scotland is being
heavily subsidised by a charity which is itself competing in an expanding
market for an ever-diminishing pool of public handouts.

Taking money from one good cause to spend on another isn't the answer. But
the Scottish Parliament's spending priorities must more accurately reflect
the relative harm caused by drink and drug abuse. If, as I suspect, that
means putting both issues at the forefront of our priorities, we must have
the courage to do that. With the Parliament we can change much more than
just funding. It's a chance to change our whole way of thinking. "Joined-up
government" may have become a cliche, but drug and alcohol abuse are prime
examples of issues which can be tackled effectively only on a
cross-departmental basis.

Our focus must be on prevention, and that means looking at the wider
picture. Unemployment, social deprivation, poor housing, educational
failure, boredom, family breakdown: these are both the causes and the end
results of the vicious circle of drug and alcohol abuse. Breaking that
circle means pooling the efforts of Government by co-ordinating strategy
across departments from health, to education and employment, to home affairs.

I suggest a powerful, cross-party drug and alcohol committee which would
develop a strategy, based on best practice, and be drawn up in consultation
with key players from local government, voluntary sector, health and
education professions, youth groups, and the criminal justice system. The
committee should be able to initiate legislation where necessary, and would
be responsible for setting realistic targets and monitoring delivery of the
programme across Government.

Education will be at the heart of any strategy. Public debate on the drugs
issue has, up until now, been characterised by prejudice and fear. The
problem of drug abuse must be approached in a much more responsible and
informed way, and that means dealing in facts and figures rather than
politics and prejudice. When it comes to young people, the "just say no"
approach is patronising and unrealistic. Any long-term change in attitude
has to be based on informed decision-making. Early intervention in schools
with educational initiatives from age five upwards will ensure young people
are equipped to make responsible choices.

One of the strong messages I took away from the Scotland Against Drugs
campaign was that young people are cynical about politicians expressing
such concern about drugs while saying very little about alcohol abuse.
Education strategies must reject this hypocrisy by giving due weight to
both drug and alcohol misuse.

Part of the problem is access to accurate and objective information. While
the dangers of drugs are regularly dramatised, the damage caused by alcohol
goes largely undocumented. Ten years ago, police reports were obliged to
state if alcohol or drugs was a factor in the crime. This is no longer the
case. These days we can only guess at how many assaults and breaches of the
peace are drink or drug-fuelled. Similarly, health boards are currently
unable to calculate how much of their budget is spent on tackling alcohol
abuse. We must have this data if we are to make informed choices.

The Scottish Parliament must also set priorities with dealing with
offenders. For drug-related crimes we need a criminal justice system which
can distinguish between addicts and dealers and which can deal effectively
with crimes of need and crimes of greed. Law enforcement should be targeted
at those who produce, smuggle, and sell drugs, and these crimes should
attract tough custodial sentences. But an affective penal system is not
about locking up victims of debilitating conditions because of a political
refusal to have an objective and informed debate on the use of cannabis.
The Scottish Parliament could lead the way by setting up a fully
independent inquiry to examine this issue in a non-political context.

Inside prisons, the emphasis must be on rehabilitation. Only by breaking
the addiction can we break the cycle of crime. The consistent
under-resourcing of Scotland's prison service has rendered prisons
incapable of dealing with their internal drug problems, let alone provide a
safe context in which to rehabilitate addicts. The criminal justice system
in Scotland must have the resources to run effective drug and alcohol
rehabilitation programmes, and to provide properly supervised non-custodial
sentences to give long-term support to addicts and alcoholics, their
families, and the wider community. With very young offenders the focus must
be on dealing with the addiction at an early stage, and this is best done
from within society's institutions. Automatically excluding pupils found
with alcohol or drugs simply forces the problem underground by guaranteeing
their complete exclusion from society. Schools must be given the support to
protect all pupils, including, and perhaps especially, those who already
abuse, from the damaging effects of substance addiction.

If we are truly committed to stepping up the battle against drug and
alcohol abuse we must as a nation have the courage to change the way we
think and change the way we act. The advent of our own Scottish Parliament
is the focus we need. It is a real opportunity to implement a comprehensive
strategy developed out of informed, participative debate, and based on a
set of pragmatic priorities. This is the first, vital step in excising
Scotland's demons.