Written question asked by John Hayes (Conservative) on Tuesday, 28 November 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 30 November 2006. It was answered by Lord Coaker (Labour) on Tuesday, 5 December 2006 on behalf of the Home Office.

Drugs

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the most recent estimate is of total value of annual trade in each major illegal drug type in the UK.

Answer

Information provided in the following table relates to aggregate expenditure for each major drug type in 2003-04. It was published in Home Office Online Report 16/06 ““Measuring different aspects of problem drug use methodological development”” available at:"http:/www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs06/rdsolr1606.pdf."Every effort has been made to ensure these estimates are accurate. However, the methods used to obtain them are complex and it should be recognised that there is a plus or minus range. These are shown as the error margins quoted in the table. These should not be regarded as precise statements of reliability and care should be taken to ensure that these limitations are taken into account when the data are used.

Baseline estimates of UK drug market size for 2003-04
	Expenditure (£ million)	Error margin
Cannabis	1,031	±432.5
Amphetamines	312	±81.9
Ecstasy	267.8	±85.9
Powder cocaine	973.3	±267.3
Crack	1,480.4	±394.29
Heroin	1,206.7	±227.65
Total	5,271.2	±1,310
Note:
The error margins quoted in the table are a very rough attempt to quantify the large range of uncertainty surrounding the estimates. They should not be regarded as precise statements of reliability.

Secondary information

Type: Written question
Reference: 107205; 454 c279-80W;454 c282-3W
Session: 2006-07
Subjects: Drug seizures
Link: View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk

Drugs

Secondary information

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