News
Launch of 'Drugs: facing facts'
The launch of the 'Drugs: facing facts' on 8 March 2007 included a discussion of the report's main findings and the future of drugs policy after the imminent review of the National Drug Strategy.
Contributions from the panel are available to download in MP3 format below.
Listen: Matthew Taylor, RSA Chief Executive, MP3 file, 3.2MB
Listen: Anthony King, Chairman of the RSA Commission on Illegal Drugs, MP3 file, 9MB
Listen: Brian Iddon MP, Chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Drugs Misuse Group, MP3 file, 10MB
Listen: Tom Wood, Chairman Scottish Association of Alcohol and Drug Action Teams, MP3 file, 6.1MB
Reaction to 'Drugs: facing facts'
News and comment
- Telegraph.co.uk: Drugs are, and should be treated as, a menace
- The Guardian, Stop the war
- The Independent, A startling injection of common sense
- The Mirror, War on drugs pouring money down the drain
- The Scotsman, 'Moral panic' of drug laws isolates users and fuels crime, says report
- Daily Record, What's Your Poison?
Other comment
- Philip Johnston in the Telegraph.co.uk
- Alice Miles in The Times
- India Knight in The Sunday Times
- The Guardian, News blog: Are Britain's drugs laws driven by moral panic
- Drugscope, DrugScope welcomes ‘watershed’ RSA report on drugs
- Transform Drug Policy Foundation, RSA Drugs Report - so near and yet so far
RSA Commission at The Scottish Parliament
Members of the RSA Commission on Illegal Drugs, Communities and Public Policy attended an event at The Scottish Parliament on Monday 27 February 2006 to examine the issue of drugs misuse, and whether new approaches or legislative options are needed to tackle the UK-wide drugs problem.
Read more about the event at The Scottish Parliament website
Strategy unit report
The Commission on Illegal Drugs, Communities and Public Policy welcomed the release of the 2003 Strategy Unit report - 'Understanding the issues' and 'Diagnosis and Recommendations' after putting down a parliamentary question and making submissions under the Freedom of Information act for its release. The report aimed 'to identify the mix of policies which will substantially reduce the harms caused by drugs to users and others.'
Read Diagnosis and Recommendations
RSA lecture: There is no such thing as harmless drug use: but what harms? whose harms? and measured how?
On January 25 2006 Professor John Strang gave a lecture in the main RSA lecture series entitled, 'There is no such thing as harmless drug use: but what harms? whose harms? and measured how?'
Professor Strang is Director of the National Addiction Centre at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London. He was the special consultant advisor on drug treatment services to the Department of Health from 1986 to 2003.
