CALL FOR PUPIL DRUG AMNESTY

Top Policeman Says Young Dealers And Loan-Shark Victims Need Help To Beat
Their Problems

A senior police officer yesterday called for a national amnesty for
schoolchildren who are dealing in drugs or find themselves the victims of
peddlers and loan sharks.

Chief Superintendent Stewart Davidson called for the radical action in an
attempt to curb the growing influence of dealers in Scottish schools and to
free pupils from their grip.

Mr Davidson said there was increasing evidence that children as young as 12
were too frightened to go to school because they owe money to pushers. He
called for the setting up of an intermediate agency and a phone helpline to
enable youngsters to shake off the menace of dealers.

Mr Davidson, who is the president of the Association of Scottish Police
Superintendents (ASPS) told its annual conference in Peebles yesterday that
urgent action was needed to fight the drugs problem in school playgrounds.

He said: "We are becoming increasingly concerned about the number of young
people - some as young as 12 - who are in hock or frighteningly in debt to
dealers.

"Evidence is emerging that some of these children are so terrified of
violence and other types of retribution from the evil dealers that they are
too frightened to go to school for fear of being met at the school gates,
and indeed playgrounds, by these dealers.

"Other young people have run away from home in fear of their lives. They are
too terrified to confide in their parents. They are worried that if they
turn to a member of staff they may be expelled and they feel alienated from
the police because they fear prosecution."

Mr Davidson said some children owe four-figure sums to dealers and are
forced into a life of crime to repay the debt.

"Young people trapped in this web of drugs need help to find a way out and
so the association proposes an amnesty for children caught in this vicious
spiral. This would guarantee immunity from prosecution and help smash the
insidious fear that pervades many young lives.

"We would also like to see an intermediate agency set up - a helpline
perhaps - which would give them a lifeline to turn to when the dealers and
loan sharks descend.

"We are sure that an amnesty would work, as long as we are determined to
make life better for the young people who shape tomorrow's society. It would
break the chain of terror for many and release them from the shackles of the
drugs culture."

However, the proposals were met with a mixed response from educationalists
and drugs agency workers.

David Eaglesham, the general secretary of the Scottish Secondary Teachers
Association, said: "The idea of some kind of intermediary organisation is an
excellent one. If kids have these difficulties they are not just going to
nip along to their guidance teacher because they quite rightly would be
afraid of the consequences.

"The conspiracy of silence in schools is a very dangerous thing. Bullying is
one that is very often covered by this. There are structures in schools
which do the best they can but there is no guarantee kids will use those
structures and something like a hotline, which has a sort of street-cred,
might be more acceptable.

"The idea of a formal amnesty is more problematic in that, what would it
cover and how would it be operated? An amnesty can be a very effective way
of dealing with things and we would be interested to hear more detailed
proposals."

But Tino Ferri, of the National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of
Women Teachers, doubted an amnesty would help solve the problem.

He said: "I am a great believer that the softly-softly approach is all very
well but the people who indulge in that approach usually end up getting
kicked in the teeth.

"If these kids are terrified of coming forward at the moment I don't see how
giving them an amnesty is going to make them declare themselves. I don't see
how that is going to alleviate the problem these kids have, if they have got
themselves in to debt with the dealers.

"The helpline might be something we could look at but they should be
concentrating on the people who are supplying, the people who are hovering
around schools targeting the kids.

"If a helpline is set up and it makes a contribution to helping wean these
kids off drugs, fine. I am all in favour of doing something to alleviate the
problems but I don't see how a general amnesty is going to work."

Mike Cadger, the project manager of Crew 2000, an Edinburgh-based drugs
harm-reduction agency said that a lot of young people make a postive choice
to experiment with particular substances but that is not to say they are not
in any difficulties or will not face difficulties.

He added: "The reality of the experience of most young people is that they
and most of their mates can take drugs in some kind of social setting
without any real problem other than the threat of being criminalised. We
would welcome any steps which help young people from becoming criminalised
and stigmatised and as a result having a negative or adverse effect on their
future prospects.

"We certainly don't want young people who may be in serious trouble, in
terms of dependency or getting into debt as a result of a drug habit, from
going any further down that route and welcome any solutions that are offered
that can help avoid that situation but we don't think one agency, working in
isolation from anything else that is going on, is the answer."

Children as young as eight are turning to drugs to alleviate the stress of
modern living, according to a Crew 2000-commissioned survey published yesterday.

Children said that the stresses and strains of being a young person in the
1990s meant that drugs were sometimes the only way to relax.

They claimed that using drugs was an issue of choice and personal
responsibility and that it was not realistic to simply tell people that
drugs were bad for them.

The survey, carried out between last November and January, said that from
the 222 people questioned, 85 per cent were given drugs by their friends.
Statistics also showed that 58 per cent mixed drugs and alcohol with 26 per
cent sometimes drove while on drugs.