Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken. I know that we share an understanding across the House of the seriousness of this important subject. The measures in this legislation are designed to implement a coalition agreement that we would introduce a system of temporary bans on new legal highs and psychoactive substances while health issues are considered by independent experts. We will not permanently ban a substance without receiving full advice from the ACMD. That was the Government’s commitment. I hope that I can reassure noble Lords that, although this has come before the House in this legislation, we have not been neglectful of the need to act quickly on these matters. We know that this is a fast-moving subject. We have, for example, completed a three-month pilot to explore improvements to the current forensic early-warning system for indentifying new and emerging drugs, which are emerging all the time. The forensic early warning system will see the Government and the forensic community working together to proactively identify emerging drugs using a range of methods including laboratory testing and analysis of police seizures. I will not say more about that, but I wanted to share it with the House because it is important that, while we legislate on the need to be able to bring in these temporary bans, a lot of work takes place alongside that. Of course, we also rely on the expert advice of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which we consider to be an important part of the process. Indeed, my right honourable friend the Home Secretary has already asked the ACMD to produce a further report in the summer, looking at how we will take this overall policy forward in a more general way. Clause 152 introduces Schedule 17 provisions for temporary class drug orders by virtue of amendments to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. The new provisions will ensure that our drug laws are responsive to the changing drug landscape. New emerging psychoactive substances come at pace out of laboratories where they are designed. As has been mentioned, these laboratories are not necessarily located in this country. The substances may also be marketed from abroad and, as we have heard, over the web. Suppliers market them to young people in particular. We propose to remove from these unscrupulous manufacturers and suppliers the opportunity to cause harm to the public with these new synthetic drugs. The UK’s response, including the use of the new powers, will remain proportionate to the threat that a new drug poses. The Secretary of State must meet two conditions to invoke a temporary class drug order which are aligned to current provisions for permanent drug control. The first condition is to have established that the drug in question must not be caught under the 1971 Act. The second condition, which we introduced in response to the concerns expressed by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs and in the other place, is that ACMD must be consulted or have made a recommendation for an order to be made. The ACMD will continue to be entrusted with the provision of comprehensive advice to government on measures that ought to be taken. As an independent expert body, it will provide best advice that may or may not include a recommendation to make a temporary class drug order. It may or may not include broader advice. The Government have no intention of fettering the basis on which its experts advise. Noble Lords will be interested to know that we will shortly be receiving from the ACMD its general advice on approaches to demand and supply of new psychoactive substances. We will give full consideration to that advice and implement it where appropriate. The noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, suggests in her amendments that the supply of a temporary class drug should be regulated under the Intoxicating Substances (Supply) Act 1985, I believe with the purpose of restricting sales to a person under the age of 18. I commend her focus on protecting young people from these drugs and their harms. She and I have discussed this very important area and I hope that we will continue to do so. However, if the ACMD and the Secretary of State consider that a drug’s harms are or have the potential to warrant temporary control, it is the Government's policy to take steps that protect all of society, not just those under the age of 18. I was also asked—I think by the noble Baroness—about the need for more information to be provided, particularly to young people. We are hoping to improve this situation. Since I took up my post in the Home Office, I have written to the organisers of music and pop festivals which take place around the country at this time of year. My predecessor did this last year. It was a good way to get that information across to the people who attend these festivals—that is, through the organisers. That would apply particularly to some of the young people the noble Baroness mentioned. The new powers will bring control of a temporary class drug order under the 1971 Act, which requires that an initial impact assessment is made. Under the current provisions, a further, fuller impact assessment is required if a drug is to be permanently controlled, and in more detail where any legitimate use of the drug has been identified. We want to avoid duplicating those arrangements that are already in place. In addition, annual publications of drug misuse and enforcement statistics and research outcomes in the delivery of our policies will also give effect to noble Lords’ and the Government’s shared purpose of gathering evidence to inform our policies. We regard that as very important. The noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, mentioned methadrone and the Mixmag survey. Although mephedrone became a controlled class B drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act on 16 April 2010, and the Mixmag survey of 16 to 24 year-olds survey showed that since the drug was banned 56 per cent of respondents said that their use of the drug had decreased or stopped, perhaps particularly important was the fact that since the ban approximately 141 kilos of mephedrone were seized by the UK Border Agency. That is a quantity of the drug that has not gone into the public arena for use by young people. Further amendments seek to require the Secretary of State to review the new provisions in consultation with the ACMD. I will expand on my answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, with reference to the current provisions of the 1971 Act, under which the ACMD has a statutory duty to, "““keep under review the situation in the United Kingdom with respect to drugs””," and to advise Government on drug policy. I come back to the fact that we think that it is important that when we are advised—and the committee has a statutory duty to advise—we take very seriously the advice that the Government are given. We believe that all our drug policies should be kept under review. We have made this commitment in our Drug Strategy, by placing the ACMD’s advice on new psychoactive substances at the heart of enabling the delivery of the strategy. Members of the House will perhaps be aware that there is a draft working protocol between the advisory committee and the Home Secretary. Copies of that have been in the Library for some time. On that basis, I ask the noble Baroness and noble Lords to withdraw their amendment.