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Scotland: Forum sets out radical drugs plan |
A report to be published by the Scottish Parliament calls for radical new ways to tackle the damage done by drugs and alcohol.
Recommendations include the setting up of "consumption rooms" where addicts would be able to take drugs safely and for heroin to be prescribed to users.
The report also suggests the taxation of cannabis to enable it to be more tightly regulated. 
Whether you like or not, government intervention, by way of regulation and taxation of cannabis is the only way the growing cannabis problem can be slowed down.
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The report, from Scotland's Futures Forum, will be unveiled later.
The think-tank was established by the parliament and was tasked with looking at the challenges facing Scotland and seeking ways to meet those challenges.
In this latest report it asked how the damage caused by alcohol and drugs in Scotland could be halved by 2025.
It examined the idea of drug consumption rooms and heroin-assisted treatment to combat the high levels of drug-related deaths and hepatitis C infection.
It also studied law enforcement and found prison unproductive and unsustainable for low-level alcohol and drug offences.
The forum believes cannabis should be taxed and highly regulated to help reduce availability and harm.
Former health minister Susan Deacon, who is now professor of social change at Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh, said it was important to be "open-minded" about the possible solutions to the drugs problem.
She said: "No-one is saying that there should not be an important enforcement element in drugs policy or the justice system does not have a role to play but I think there is widespread concern that there has been a disproportionate emphasis on criminal justice issues.
"We must look at drugs, alcohol and wider addiction problems as being health and social matters not simply matters which should be looked at within our criminal justice system."
http://news.bbc.co.uk
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