Drugs: Smuggling

(asked on 11th June 2021) - View Source

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 7 June 2021 to Question 8525 which noted that the cost of Operation Venetic is unknown, and to the Answer of 26 May 2021 to Question 5143 which noted that no assessment of the effects of Operation Venetic on the drugs markets has been made, if she will take steps to commission a full evaluation of the cost-effectiveness of Operation Venetic to the taxpayer, including estimates of (a) total costs across all relevant UK agencies; (b) total income raised from seized assets; (c) impacts on drug availability, rates of use, drug-related harms, and the associated costs and savings; and (d) impact on market-related violence and the associated costs and benefits, with reference to the finding of the Home Office’s 2017 evaluation of the 2010 drug strategy that drugs market violence is an unintended consequence of enforcing drug laws.


Answered by
Kit Malthouse Portrait
Kit Malthouse
This question was answered on 16th June 2021

Operation VENETIC is an ongoing operation yielding tangible results on a weekly basis. As law enforcement continue to act on the significant volume of intelligence received from Operation VENETIC, we are not currently evaluating its impact. We will keep this under review. The National Crime Agency has led a number of investigations under Operation VENETIC and publishes regular press notices on the outcomes of these investigations. A wider overview of Operation VENETIC can also be found in the NCA’s 2021 National Strategic Assessment.

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