The cost of drugs
Fraser Nelson 5:09pm
To clarify my earlier blog, I certainly did not mean the murdered prostitutes in Suffolk were “victims” of the government’s failed war on drugs. They were born free and chose drugs. My point is how much cheaper and easier it has become in the last ten years to take such a choice. The point of prohibition is to make heroin unaffordable, or very difficult to get hold of. Of course this price collapse started before Labour came to power - the earliest figure I have is £88/gram for July 1995 v £40 now. It was even higher in the 1980s - I have no idea how Zammo afforded it.
Perhaps they scrapped Grange Hill because the drug plot-lines would have been overwhelming. In 1994, just 1% of UK schoolchildren reported cocaine use. Now it’s 5%. And Britain - not the Netherlands - is Europe’s capital of ecstasy use – not surprising seeing as the price of a tab has collapsed from £11 in 1999 to £4 in December 2004. Heroin deaths rose fivefold from 1993 to 2006.
There is much talk about controlling drink prices – and I bet the dealers are wishing Tesco well in its demands for booze price control as part of its principled campaign against alcoholism, or did I mean independent off licenses. The pricier drink becomes, the more young people will be pushed into the arms of a British narcotics industry that has never had it so good. The pricier drink becomes, the more young people will be pushed into the arms of a British narcotics industry that has never had it so good.
Previous
Comments
THX1138
February 24th, 2008 6:30pmAlcopops & cheap booze were the legal drug dealers answer to getting the rave generation back from E's. Thousands of young people going out on a Saturday night popping a pill or two & no alcohol I wonder what was easier to police & more damaging to health & society the E culture of the 80's & mid 90's or the binge drinking we see in are city centres now on a Saturday Night? Alcohol is by far the more dangerous & destructive drug for sale on the streets of the UK.
David
February 24th, 2008 7:35pm"The point of prohibition is to make heroin unaffordable, or very difficult to get hold of." Come on Fraser, you know that's never going to happen. Prohibition does nothing but create crime. A serious approach to drugs means legalising them and providing rehabilitation facilities. You wouldn't advocate banning alcohol (destroys brain cells, causes serious organ damage, mood altering to the extent of violence) on grounds of liberty and common sense. Why do the same with drugs?
Austin Barry
February 24th, 2008 8:06pmAre our young people so supine and daft that if drink prices rise the logical corollary is "Oh, well, pass the smack, can I borrow your needle"? I don't think so. I suspect that there will always be a constituency of hard drug users and not much you can do about it except try and disrupt the line of supply. I recall that my old chum Bill Burroughs, the dope-fiend novelist and wife killer, always used to prattle on in his bleak croak about the "algebra of need", as though addiction were subject to the same immutable laws as mathematics. And I think he was right: drugs will always attract certain types and the price is a relatively immaterial element.
Laurie
February 25th, 2008 6:27amThe notion that drug users are price sensitive consumers is not one that I find convincing and requires more evidence than has been presented here to be considered seriously. I've never really been that into drugs myself but I have certainly moved in circles where they were widely used and have seen some striking examples of the degradation of previously reasonable people. I can't comment on the UK scene as I am not there but I didn't see any mention of ice. Now if you want a really unpleasant, cheap drug, ice is it. In Sydney we have built specialist rooms (the old padded cells!) to incarcerate the ice induced maniacs who are regularly picked up off the streets. Horribly addictive, powerfully psychotic, cheap as chips and can be manufactured from cold tablets! I'll take the drunks and the junkies any day! I also tend to agree with Austin that there is a certain drug constituency that is not terribly elastic, it grows and shrinks from time to time but never by very much. Those who seek degradation will always find a way, those who don't, well most manage to escape.