3.3 Uk Drug Policy

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3.3 UK Drug Policy: where are we now
Although the UK already took a prohibitionist stance towards many psychoactive substances prior to this, for example the Dangerous Drugs Act 1920, the MDA consolidated, much of this earlier legislation, and introduced some important changes, whilst creating a more heavily committed model of prohibition backed by higher law enforcement and punishment (Gossop, 2000). Other than some minor changes that we aim to explore further, this piece of legislation still largely remains the staple of the UK’s approach to substance misuse. The act claims that “It shall be the duty of the Advisory Council to keep under review the situation in the United Kingdom with respect to drugs which are being or appear to them …show more content…

It states that it sets out to achieves this by imposing a complete ban on the possession, supply, manufacture, the import and export of controlled drugs except as allowed by regulations or by licence from the Secretary of State. It was hoped, that by doing so drug misuse and the societal problems associated with it can not only be prevented, but in the long-term almost eradicated (Gossop, 2000). For the first time the legislation broke down illegal substances into three categories of A, B, C (See appendix 1 for table). The basis for the classification system in the MDA is intended to be the harmfulness and danger that is associated with each type of controlled drug. Therefore, the punishment received would be respectable to the classification of the drug one possessed, for example, an individual caught in possession of a class A substance such as heroin could face upwards of 7 years in prison (see appendix 1). However, the Act does not give a criteria of harm or dangerousness by which they may be judged. This leaves a gap that has been filled with repeated debates over how harm should be defined, on which drugs are more harmful and about why the controlled drugs should be treated no differently to two licit drugs, alcohol and tobacco, each of which cause more mortality and morbidity than all the controlled drugs combined (Reuter & Stevens, 2007). As shown with the disparities in sentencing for

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