PRISONS CRACK DOWN ON DRUGS

A NEW drugs tsar is to be appointed as part of a government crackdown on
trafficking and addiction in Scottish prisons.

Henry McLeish, the Scottish Office minister, will announce the initiative
tomorrow in measures designed to reduce the level of drug abuse in
Scotland's 22 jails, where more than 25% of prisoners regularly use drugs.

The scale of the problem will also be highlighted tomorrow with the release
of a video from Shotts high security prison. It shows relatives and friends
of prisoners smuggling drugs through kissing, in cups and on their bodies.

McLeish hopes that the government crackdown will stem the flow of drugs to
prison dealers. It will include scanning all visitors with a UKP35,000 ion
spectrometer that can pick up tiny traces of drugs on clothes and fingers.
A pilot scanning scheme has run in Shotts for the past two months.

Other elements of the initiative include a family support programme,
sniffer dogs and mandatory drug testing. Prisoners found using or dealing
may be banned from receiving visitors. At present 70 inmates in Shotts are
barred from seeing family or friends.

With drugs likely to be a key issue in the Scottish general election,
McLeish emphasises the government's determination to try to eliminate drugs
from Scotland's prisons.

He said: "Drugs are a huge problem in the prison environment. They are
simply an evil currency leading to debts, threats, intimidation, blackmail,
extortion, violence and in certain instances death.

"Families of prisoners are put under intolerable pressure to buy and
deliver drugs. Addressing this problem is crucial because in some respects
it does reflect what is happening in the wider society."

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski