My Lords, I thank all three noble Lords for their contributions to this important debate. A number of interesting points have been made. I will attempt to address them but, first, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and the Labour Party for their support. Obviously, I regret the fact that the Liberal Democrats are unable to support this important public health and safety measure.
The Government disagreed with independent experts on this matter, as was noted by all the speakers in the debate. Turning to questions about that decision, we are of course grateful to the ACMD for its detailed report. ACMD advice is an essential part of our decision-making and we continue to have complete faith in its quality and rigour. However, the Government are entitled and expected to take a broader view, taking into account other relevant factors, which was necessary in this case. The ACMD referred to reports of increased neurological and social harms, such as drug driving and littering, associated with nitrous oxide misuse. This is alongside its widespread availability for illegitimate use and high usage, including among children and young people; I referred in my opening remarks to the large canisters that are now readily available.
As the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, noted, anti-social behaviour and visible drug use are issues of significant public concern, and we know that the harms of nitrous oxide misuse are being felt by communities. For that reason, the Government decided to go further than the ACMD’s advice to protect the public and seek to control nitrous oxide under the Misuse of Drugs Act
1971 as a class C drug. This will provide law enforcement with more tools to take action against illegitimate supply and use. As the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, helpfully pointed out, this is not the first time that a Government have disagreed with the ACMD: in 2014, for example, khat was controlled under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 contrary to the ACMD’s recommendations. I am also grateful to the noble Lord for mentioning the 2008 decision that reclassified cannabis as a class B drug against the advice of the ACMD; I applaud his decision then.
The Government consulted on this issue. We fulfilled our statutory consultation requirement to seek the views of the ACMD and considered its report carefully. However, as I just said, the Government are entirely permitted to take a broader view; the reasons for this are set out in our response to the ACMD, published on 27 March, which outlined the clear health and social harms associated with nitrous oxide use that led the Government to control the substance under the Misuse of Drugs Act.
The Government also undertook a public consultation to ascertain the nature and scale of legitimate use of nitrous oxide before formulating this policy, the results of which were published on 5 September. Provisions to enable legitimate drug use will be set out in a following SI that will come into force at the same time as this order, which is the normal legislative process for controlling a substance under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. So, in answer to the question from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, there will be no gap.
On police support, we have heard from some in front-line policing who welcome these new powers. The National Police Chiefs’ Council is also supportive of this ban.
With regards to the treatment aspect, I could not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, more. It is never an either/or situation; it is a “both” situation. In relation to access to treatment, I refer Members to the Government’s drug strategy, From Harm to Hope, which was published in December 2021. It is clear about our ambition to achieve stigma-free treatment, providing the full positive effect of treatment services for those seeking help. Through this strategy, we are investing more than £2.8 billion over three years to support people through treatment and recovery; it includes support for those who have used a range of drugs, including nitrous oxide, and are suffering health harms. In the light of the reported rise in harms to individual users and society associated with heavy nitrous oxide use, we believe that it is necessary to take action also to restrict access to this harmful drug and reduce its misuse by, as I said, classifying it as a class C drug.
As regards legitimate use—obviously, those were legitimate questions from noble Lords—we are conscious of the need to ensure that our approach enables the continued use of nitrous oxide for legitimate and lawful purposes, of which there are many. The Government accepted the ACMD’s recommendation to consult on legitimate uses, as I said. We published our response on 5 September. That information is now being used to design the regime that will enable lawful use for legitimate purposes.
The exact proposals are still being drawn up and will be set out in a subsequent statutory instrument, as I said. However, it is worth repeating that the order we are debating today will come into effect at the same time as the accompanying amendments to the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001, so there will be no gap between the control of nitrous oxide under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and provisions enabling its legitimate, lawful access.
The noble Earl, Lord Russell, asked about the risk of criminalising young people. That is a perfectly valid concern: will it result in the overcriminalisation of young people in particular given that the drug is so prevalent among those aged 16 to 24? However, we can assure the Committee that the Government seek a proportionate approach, in answer to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker. We entrust that task to law enforcement agencies, which have a range of powers at their disposal to enforce the law—including out-of-court disposals, which are non-criminal sanctions, where they judge those to be proportionate and effective.
It is also our intention that the ban should have a preventive effect so that, over time, it reduces the number of users, in particular children and young people. We will update education resources for schools, directly accessing the children who may be at risk of becoming users. Those resources will describe the harms of drug taking and will communicate the new law to children. I also talked to the director of communications at the Home Office this afternoon before coming here; he assures me that work on this is well under way and, indeed, innovative.
I finish by saying to the noble Earl, Lord Russell, that the damage to their life prospects—