---

Drug Offences

Answer

We cannot currently provide this information on a national basis, or for the specified years. However, some indication is provided by research published by the Home Office in 2004 from the New English and Welsh Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring Programme (NEW-ADAM).This provided information on the proportion of arrested persons testing positive for drugs who had voluntarily agreed to an interview and to provide a urine specimen for analysis. The research was undertaken in selected large custody suites in 16 police force areas between 1999 and 2001 involving approximately 3,000 arrestees, 95 per cent. of whom agreed to provide a urine sample.The research showed that for those arrestees voluntarily providing a urine sample, (a) 31 per cent. tested positive for opiates (b) 22 per cent. for cocaine and (c) 69 per cent. for any drug excluding alcohol.The NEW-ADAM survey programme has been replaced by a new, continuous, nationally-representative Arrestee Survey. Results from the first year of the survey, covering interviews with about 7,500 arrestees in 60 custody suites from around the country conducted between October 2003 and September 2004, will be published shortly. The survey is on-going and will provide information on trends in drug use among all arrestees in the future.The Drug Interventions Programme (DIP) was introduced by this Government to break the links between drugs and crime. The intensive form of the programme operates in 97 areas with a history of high levels of drug related crime. Individuals charged with a range of trigger offences, identified through research to be closely linked to drug misuse, are drug tested for specified class A drugs.New provisions contained in the Drugs Act 2005 were successfully implemented in three police force areas on 1 December 2005. Testing on arrest now becomes an alternative to testing on charge for those adults arrested for a ““trigger offence””, enabling adults misusing specified class A drugs to be identified earlier in their contact with the criminal justice system, so that they may be steered into treatment and away from crime as soon as possible. Those testing positive will be required to attend an assessment of their drug use. The provisions will be rolled out to the remaining intensive areas in England on 31 March 2006.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

47716; 442 c1718W;442 c1718W

Session

2005-06

Subjects

Arrests Drugs Offenders Misuse Testing

Contains statistics

Yes

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk