DRUGS BOSS: WHAT A MESS

DRUG policy in Britain 'is in a mess and needs to be radically
overhauled', a senior substance abuse worker has claimed.

Kendra Gray, the strategy and development manager at Burton Addiction
Centre, in Station Street, said change was essential to end the
'state-induced dependency' fostered by the existing approach.

She spoke a day after teenage addict Emma Capewell was locked up for
five years after admitting battering 69-year-old Dennis Sharp with a
scaffolding pole in his Burton home to get UKP90 to buy heroin.

Stafford Crown Court heard that the 19-year-old offender, of James
Court, Burton, left her victim lying on the floor of his home in
Harper Avenue, Horninglow, which was spattered with blood.

Mrs Gray said: "There's no justification for any type of violence at
all, but certainly not for gaining money for drugs. It was quite
calculated. She knew exactly what she was doing.

"If people can learn from this about the dangers of drugs and what
they will drive them to do, that can only be a positive thing."

The manager's comments also came a day after the UK Drug Policy
Commission published a report saying that the focus of drugs policing
should be switched to tackling associated violence rather than
concentrating on making seizures and arrests.

Chief executive Roger Howard insisted that this 'smarter' approach to
drugs policy was not calling for police to 'tolerate' drug dealing
but to target the most harmful drug activity.

However, Mrs Gray said: "I can't see how leaving lower level drug
dealers to get on with what they are doing and tackling the more
violent crimes is going to make any difference.

"The people who are lower level will become higher level because they
are not being watched and tackled about what they are doing. I think
they should tackle both." Attacking current drugs policy, she then
said: "There needs to be a radical overhaul. It's in a mess.

"We've got a state-induced dependency. We've got that many people on
methadone we've swapped one addiction for another.

"We've not made people take responsibility and effectively they are
still committing crime and there are still health implications.

"There's still a cost to the benefits system and a cost to society.
People are not getting off drugs.

"What we should be doing is remaining tough on people who commit
crimes because if they have no consequences they are not going to change."

Meanwhile, Mrs Gray revealed that former Tory leader Iain Duncan
Smith, the MP and founder of the Centre for Social Justice, would
visit Burton Addiction Centre in January to learn about its work.