Drug Misuse and the Law PDF
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Drug Misuse and the Law Drug Misuse and the Law by S BRADSHAW MB ChB Ignorance of the law excuses no man; not that all men know the law, but because 'tis an excuse every man will plead, and no man can tell how to confute him. John Selden (1584-1654) Palgrave Macmillan ISBN 978-1-349-01511-5 ISBN 978-1-349-01509-2 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-01509-2 © 1972 Dr S Bradshaw Reprint of the original edition 1972 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission. Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Brunei Road Basingstoke Hampshire England In collaboration with WINTHROP LABORATORIES Winthrop House Surbiton-Upon-Thames Surrey England Acknowledgment Chapter 3 of this book is a summary of some Parliamentary discussions regarding the Misuse of Drugs Bill. Information for this chapter was taken from reports in Hansard to which acknowledgment is hereby given. SBN 333 13560 1 Contents FOREWORD page 7 INTRODUCTION page 9 PART I-BACKGROUND TO THE ACT Chapter 1. History of Control of Drug Misuse in the United Kingdom page 11 Chapter 2. Defects of Existing Legislation page 20 Chapter 3. Parliament and Controversial Aspects of Drug Misuse and Control page 22 PART II-THE ACT Chapter 4. Aims of The Act page 36 Chapter 5. Provisions of The Act page 37 Comments on Certain Provisions page 45 Index to Provisions page 47 APPENDIXA. Substances Scheduled under The Act-Proprietary Names, etc page 49 APPENDIX B. Prosecution and Punishment of Offences under The Act page 65 APPENDIX C. Recognition of Drug Misuse page 69 APPENDIX D. Statutes Concerning the Supply of Drugs page 73 APPENDIX E. Members of the Advisory Council page 74 FURTHER READING page 76 GLOSSARY page 77 Foreword Drug misuse in the United Kingdom has escalated since the early 1960s, and increasingly has affected young persons, even those of school age; and each of these developments has caused considerable concern to doctors, educators, social workers, the police, parlia mentarians, and others. The so-called 'British System' of control of drugs of dependence, a method that seemed of value at a time when there was little demand for them, was shown by events to be ineffec tive when demand increased and cultural attitudes towards such drugs changed. The Drugs (Prevention of Misuse) Act 1964 repre sented an attempt to bring amphetamines and LSD under a greater degree of control; but heroin addiction continued to grow rapidly, and increasingly became the subject of serious concern. The Home Office Advisory Committee on Drug Dependence studied a number of aspects of the drug problem in depth, and some of its findings were published (see Further Reading). It became clear, in the face of increasing demand for drugs, and the need to control more closely the prescribing of drugs to addicts, that new legislation was required, and thus the Misuse of Drugs Act (1971) came into being. This is a most complex piece of legislation which replaces previous Dangerous Drugs Acts, and provides for a wide range of flexible controls, and of penalties for those who transgress the law. It is always difficult for people to understand legislation relating to matters outside their special interests, and in the present case this is certainly true of non-medical and of most medical people; so that there was a need for a clear exposition of the provisions and impli cations of the new Act - in everyday rather than legal phraseology. Dr Bradshaw has provided this in the present book. The historical detail of parliamentary proceedings that it contains makes fascinating reading, and helps to an understanding of how legislative processes arise within Parliament. However, although Dr Bradshaw has refrained from comment on any of the points made, his selection of them for the present volume is nicely judged, and many readers will doubtless realise that much of what was said in Parliament arose from belief systems rather than scientific fact. Perusal of the full reports of the debates on the new Bill and of the debate on the report on cannabis of the Advisory Committee on Drug Dependence would repay the reader of this book who wished to explore this aspect further. 7 This book, together with a commentary on the regulations to be made under the Act (which will probably be published as a compan ion item once they are available), should provide an invaluable guide and book of reference to all those concerned with the medical, social, educational, and legal aspects of drug misuse. Doctors, educationists, social workers, the clergy, voluntary workers, and other interested persons now have at their disposal a short and lucid statement of the Act and its requirements. Many countries look to the United Kingdom with interest because it previously had little or no problem of drug dependence, but has had to face a rapidly developing problem and to take action. This book will be of particular value in providing a clear statement about the new Act that will help such countries to understand the way in which we have faced up to the problem. Dr Bradshaw is to be congratulated on providing a clear, readable, and most useful book which should find its place, not only in official libraries, but also in smaller departments and in the homes of interested persons. P H Connell MD MRCP FRCPsych DPM Physician in Psychological Medicine The Bethlem Royal Hospital and The Maudsley Hospital, London. 28 September 1972 8 Introduction During the last twenty years, and particularly the last decade, there has been a great increase of drug misuse in various countries, including the United Kingdom; and one element in efforts to contain this increase and its many serious consequences is the law. The Misuse of Drugs Act (1971) is much more than the latest of a series of United Kingdom statutes relating to drugs (see AppendixD), for it is intended to be definitive. It is of wide scope, supersedes a number of the existing Acts, and embodies certain new principles in relation to the control of drug misuse, and corresponding changes in the practice of control. Certainly it seemed that a small book like the present one might prove helpful as a guide in relation to the Act, particularly for doctors, though pharmacists, teachers, social workers, and others concerned with the drug problem will also find it useful. Part I of the book is a background section, describing the 20th century development of the drug milieu in the United Kingdom in the context of efforts at control, and the inadequacies of the existing law that were generally admitted to have been revealed in recent years; and it then summarises the opinions of informed people - as expressed in Parliament during passage of the Bill - on major matters of controversy in relation to control of drug misuse: How best to deal with the problem of cannabis and that of over-prescribing, police powers of search, etc. The great complexities of the Act will, it is hoped, become more comprehensible when viewed in the light of what is said in this first part of the book. Part II gives an outline of the aims of the new Act, and then summarises for the non-legal reader its main provisions. A short commentary on certain particularly important provisions of the Act, and an Index to the provisions complete this section. There are five appendices. Appendix A deals with substances scheduled under the Act, B with punishment of offences under the Act, and C with the recognition of drug abuse. Appendix D lists all United Kingdom statutes that have been or are concerned with the supply of drugs, and E lists the members of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which the Act establishes. Throughout the book, and of set purpose, the term 'addiction' is mostly used, rather than 'drug dependence'. (And correspondingly 'addict', 'addictive', etc, are mostly preferred.) This is still a very com- 9 mon medical usage, and there are the following extra reasons for its being appropriate in the present context. During most of the period covered by the historical section 'addiction' was the only term avail able; 'addiction' was used in the Parliamentary debates on the Bill, and has been used in the Bill itself and in certain publications of the Standing Advisory Committee on Drug Dependence; and 'addict' is shorter than, for example, 'person suffering from drug dependence of the opiate type', and is perhaps more readily understood by the lay reader. None of this, of course, alters the fact that there are good reasons for preferring the word 'dependence' in all purely scientific contexts today. The word has been recommended by WHO, and severe dependence on drugs can occur without any of the physical element of dependence (characteristic bodily effects on drug withdrawal) that the word 'addiction' strongly suggests. Perhaps, for the sake of any non-British readers, it should be stated here that in the United Kingdom a Parliamentary measure is known as a Bill (e.g. the Misuse of Drugs Bill) until it becomes law, when it is known as an Act (e.g. the Misuse of Drugs Act); and that the numbered Clauses of a Bill become Sections of the Act. This book was written for persons not on terms of everyday familiarity with the law by one of their number; and to be read as well as for reference purposes. No opinions are expressed on controversial matters. As well as the legal, medical, and pharmaceutical aspects of drug misuse, there are various social and philosophical aspects that are perhaps more important, but that, for obvious reasons, receive a mention here only in the reports of Parliamentary debates in Chapter 3. I am grateful to Dr Michael Mungavin and Mr James Hotchen MPS for their help and advice. How Caple 18 September 1972 S.B. 10 Part I-Background to TheAct Chapter 1 History of Control of Drug Misuse in the United Kingdom This brief historical review does not pretend to be exhaustive. Its purpose is to help make comprehensible the need for a measure like the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, the concern on certain matters expressed in Parliament during the Bill's passage, and the import of various provisions of the A ct. Nicotine and alcohol aside, serious abuse of drugs - that is, wide spread abuse, productive of social upset - did not occur in the United Kingdom before the mid-1950s. Long before then, of course, there were periods when particular drugs were to some extent abused, and also some well-known abusers. Thus Coleridge and De Quincey were opium addicts, and in the middle of the last century the Pharma ceutical Journal (1850, 9, 591) published this interesting tip on the weaning of addicts from their laudanum (Tincture of Opium): 'We have known the object attained by convincing the patient of the necessity of an effort on his part and directing him to fill up the bottle with water after each dose has been taken out: Laudanum was, in fact, readily purchasable from any chemist and druggist until well into the present century, although opium and all preparations of it had, under the Pharmacy Act of 1868, to be labelled 'Poison', and, under the Poisons and Pharmacy Act of 1908, could be sold only to persons known to the pharmacist concerned. During the First World War addiction to cocaine became something of a probiem among members of the Services, and before, during, and after that war the barbiturates were also subject to some abuse in this country. Under the Defence ofthe Realm (Consolidation) Regulations 1917, therefore, it became an offence to supply certain drugs to members of the armed forces except on the authority of a doctor's prescription - barbitone, cocaine, diamorphine, Indian hemp, opium, and morphine among others. This was the first occasion on which supply of a drug was limited to those for whom it had been medically prescribed. 11
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