Ten-Year Drugs Strategy

Debate between Christian Wakeford and Kit Malthouse

Monday 6th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

They, of course, have presided over the incidence of drug deaths in her city for many years now. Happily, they have made an investment in health just recently—just before the election in which they were standing to be re-elected as the Government. The hon. Lady can shout at me all she likes, but until she shouts at me and the Scottish Government, it will be hard to take her completely seriously.

Having said that, I believe that the strategy that we have put in place will have an impact in the hon. Lady’s constituency, not least because in the early part of 2019, as she will recall, it was enforcement efforts by the National Crime Agency in this country—in England—that intercepted 27 million street benzo tablets destined for Glasgow. That is the kind of impact that we can have on behalf of the whole United Kingdom.

[Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)]

I speak as chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on alcohol harm and as vice-chair of the drugs, alcohol and justice cross-party parliamentary group. Addiction is never a choice; I am grateful that the Government are now talking about drugs in terms of rehabilitation and addiction, not just criminality. However, the cheapest and most readily accessible drug is alcohol. When will the Government develop an addiction and rehabilitation strategy that will include alcohol? This is one thing I never thought I would say, but I agree with hon. Members on the SNP Front Bench. We need to tackle the stigma of addiction, so will the Government agree to tackle it and remove the exclusion of addiction from the Equality Act 2010?

[Kit Malthouse]

As my hon. Friend may know, alcohol-related crime is of deep interest to me. That interest was behind my 10-year campaign to bring in sobriety ankle bracelets, which are having an enormous impact across the country with 97% compliance. While this strategy is drug-focused, it is worth pointing out that, as I am sure he knows, quite a number of people have an addiction both to drugs and to alcohol. The provision of treatment services that are primarily for their drug addiction will have a spill-over effect on their alcohol addiction; I hope that he will see an improvement in that as well.