Public Accounts Committee questions cost effectiveness of drug treatment in the UK

The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee yesterday issued its Report on the government’s strategy for dealing with ‘Problem Drug Use’, a term referring to the estimated 330,000 users of heroin and crack cocaine. The Report quotes figures that problem drug use costs £15.3 billion, of which £13.9 billion is associated with acquisitive crimes to fund dependence. Government spending on the strategy is currently £1.2 billion per annum. The main conclusion picked up by UK media is the Committee’s statement that “we find it unacceptable that the (Home Office) has not carried out sufficient evaluation of the programme of measures in the strategy and does not know if the strategy is directly reducing the overall cost of drug-related crimes.” The MPs did, however, welcome the belated agreement of the Home Office to produce a framework to evaluate and report on the strategy. This step was taken in response to a recommendation from the National Audit Office, and initial reporting will commence in ‘late 2011’, and may represent the beginning of the Impact Assessment of drug polices called for by our colleagues at Transform Drug Policy Foundation.

Release is disappointed, however, at the lack of any honest appraisal of the continued failure of present drug policies or serious discussion of alternative measures. There is no recognition, for example, of the degree to which ‘Problem drug use’ is rendered more problematic, not less, by criminalisation or coercive treatment. The question of supplying heroin addicts with heroin was raised, but the senior Home Office official retorted that this is “absolutely not” government policy; he called it a ‘counsel of despair’ and said such a course meant addicts could never live productively or pay taxes. In fact, people are quite capable of living and working productively while on opiates; while of course individuals vary, much of the despair associated with heroin addiction stems from tying to maintain a steady supply of a drug whose expense is inflated and quality degraded by the illicit market, and the criminal relationships this imposes on users. If the market is legally regulated and distributed, health, time and freedom of attention become available once again to the user. Many productive and fulfilling lives have been lived under these more benign conditions.