Ludo Thierry
Beeb website (main news page) is carrying the story about the courageous and visionary Scots drug worker Peter Krykant. This major story is FINALLY appearing on the beeb Scotland site (thanks only to The Victoria Derbyshire programme team). Incompetence? Editorial decision? – Anyway you care to look at it beeb Scotland doesn’t come out of this well.
Link and snippet below: (I understand Victoria Derbyshire is being dumped by the beeb soon – following up too many stories with genuine public interest angles perhaps?):
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51859518
A former drug worker has said he is launching a mobile “fix room”, where addicts can take drugs under supervision, even though he faces being arrested.
Mr Krykant believes that because the van is in his name he may face arrest under the Misuse of Drugs Act.
But he says he is undeterred by the potential legal consequences.
“I’m hoping Police Scotland will see it’s not in the public interest to arrest me and understand the reason I’m going ahead with this,” he says.
Glasgow City Council first proposed introducing so-called fix rooms more than three years ago in a bid to encourage users to inject drugs in a safe and clean environment, away from the street and under medical supervision.
It was backed by the Scottish government but drug legislation is not devolved and the Westminster government blocked the scheme.
Last month, ahead of a UK-wide drugs summit, crime minister Kit Malthouse reiterated the UK government’s opposition to drug consumption rooms, describing them as a “distraction”.
But some experts disagree.
Niamh Eastwood, from the drug charity Release, believes evidence for the effectiveness of drug consumption rooms is “overwhelming”.
“It’s for those who don’t have a space to inject privately and safely. It brings them into these facilities and also is an opportunity to engage people.”
She described Mr Krykant as “courageous” and said it was “shameful” he felt he had to act himself.
“He’s stepping in where actually government should be,” she said.
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
For more on the extensive and successful use of safe drug consumption rooms across Europe see this:
European Monitoring centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (2018) ‘Drug consumption rooms: an overview of provision and evidence’
Source: http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/topics/pods/drug-consumption-rooms_en
As someone with little knowledge, I found it a fascinating read: I had no idea similar practices were so widespread. It provides context for the offhand, dismissive response by the Tory Westminster government on this important subject.
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Hear, hear – I second that emotion.
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“”He’s stepping in where actually government should be,” she said.””
And where the Scottish Government wants to be because it has looked at the evidence that supports these rooms as a method of helping drug addicts but is being blocked by the Westminster Gov.
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The UK Government script as delivered by Mr Kit Malthouse is that drug consumption rooms are not a magic bullet. They frame this as if it were the only approach being suggested. And, of course, the media in Scotland do not challenge this. Some drugs workers, if interviewed, will talk about the range of measures being required – including safe consumption rooms – but, since, often, many are former drugs users themselves, the interviewer will emphasise this fact, without comment, but dogwhistling the question: “Can you really trust such a person?”
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Indeed Alasdair.
The set of typical operational and outcome objectives associated with these facilities make it clear that organisations delivering these critical services across Europe are NOT relying on a single ‘magic bullet’. The Tories in Westminster are being disingenuous at best: as for the Tories at Holyrood on this matter ….!
Source: http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/topics/pods/drug-consumption-rooms_en
These objectives include among many others:
– To provide further services at the same facility, e.g. shelter, case management, counselling, treatment
– To increase client awareness of treatment options and promote clients’ service access
– To increase chances that client will accept a referral to treatment.
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In fact BBC Scotland researchers were the ones who set up the Victoria Derbyshire segment for network. Sorry to burst your usual half-arsed bubble of unresearched unchecked assertion
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Yeh but, yeh but, the point is that the Scottish website did not post it! That’s propaganda?
Usual half-arsed bubble of unresearched unchecked assertion? Nice one!
TuSC gets less than its due share of trolling
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