Ross Thompson, in all his pitiful glory and regular Tweets of lies has outdone himself, again!
Below is a screengrab of a tweet he sent out on the 13th October (Saturday), I assume in follow up to his, “we can get cocaine delivered to our doors quicker than a Pizza delivery” statement on Question Time. The tweet below was in direct response to having his arse handed to him on a plate by a Criminologist who has worked with drug users in his own constituency, who stated, (paraphrasing) “global evidence suggests that tougher criminal sentencing doesn’t help drug users, it only creates prisons full of drugs users and doesn’t tackle the causes of drug use”.
Before we look at the point Ross makes in his tweet of lies, I have used full years for the comparison. The SNP were elected half way through 2007 so it wouldn’t be right to use 2007 as a starting point when half the year had already passed by and potentially half the deaths had already occurred before the SNP could even begin to affect change for that year.
Ross’s tweet is stating that “The SNP are responsible for a drugs culture in Scotland that has been allowed to escalate out of control. This is because of the SNP being soft on policing and budget cuts to alcohol and drugs partnerships. He thinks we need to get tough.”
Let’s analyse.
The statistics available to Scotland go back to 1996 and are linked in source 1 below. They are collated by the National Records of Scotland. There have been revisions to the definitions used that constituted a “drugs related death”.
Between 1996 and 2017, which is the most recent data available as per the National Records of Scotland and the EU Drug Report 2017, linked in source 2, there were 244 drug deaths in Scotland in 1996 and 934 in 2017. Now to most that would seem like a huge increase, and it is, however, is this all the fault of the SNP? Let’s check.
Between 1996 and 2007, not under the SNPs administration, the number of deaths increased from 244 per year to 455. That’s an increase of 86.5%. In the 11 years between 1996 and 2007, only 3 of those years saw a decrease from the year prior, there were 8 years where the drug deaths increased across the years.
Between 2008 and 2017, under the SNPs administration. The number of deaths increased from 574 per year to 934. That’s an increase of 62.71%. In the 9 years between 2008 and 2017, 4 of those years saw a decrease. There were 5 years where drug deaths increased across the years.
I found this paragraph (source 3) in particular very odd from the National Records for Scotland (which is a Crown Company)
“Based on the definition used for these statistics, there were 934 drug-related deaths in 2017, 66 (8%) more than in 2016. This was the highest number recorded since the series of figures began in 1996, and was 479 (105%) more than in 2007, when there were 455 such deaths. The ‘underlying’ increase since 2007 is only slightly smaller when account is taken of the effect on the statistics of changes in the classification of drugs – refer to paragraphs 3.1.4 to 3.1.6.”
I wonder why they compared it back to 2007 when the SNP took office. No other publication since 1996 has made such sweeping statements based on when a political party or the political structure in Scotland changed.
But it gets better folks. Paragraph 3.1.4 as mentioned above has this to say for itself…
“As mentioned in paragraph 2.9 (and explained in detail in Annex F) the ‘coverage ‘of NRS’s standard (Drugs Strategy ‘baseline’) definition of a drug-related death ‘widens’ every time another drug is added to the list of substances which are controlled under the Misuse of Drugs Act.”
The Misuse of Drugs Act. What’s that I hear you say? Well let’s just look and see what it is and, since we are at it, let’s look at the list of Drugs from pre-2007 compared to today.
The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 is a reserved UK Act of Law that Scottish MSPs cannot change or alter (source 4). Since the SNP came to power, it has had 10 drugs added to the list of controlled drugs (source 5). So with that in mind, let’s use Table 1 from the National Records of Scotland to compare from 1996 to 2017 and see where we end up (source 6).
Between 1996 and 2007, not under the SNPs administration, the number of deaths increased from 244 per year to 474. That’s an increase of 94.3%.
Between 2008 and 2017, under the SNPs administration. The number of deaths increased from 590 per year to 935. That’s an increase of 58.5%.
The number of extra deaths counted in the series due to changes in UK Law between 1996 and 2007 and 2008 and 2017 were 74 and 155. Due to changes in UK Law over the past 20+ years, there has been a net increase of 81 deaths attributed to the numbers of drug deaths associated under the SNPs Government due simply to changes in UK Law affected at Westminster, or 8.7% of all drug deaths in Scotland in 2017.
In Summary
Even with this 8.7% increase “added” to the list, the number of drug related deaths in Scotland under this SNP administration has increased by 58.5% using the consistent series compared to 94.3% under the Conservatives (pre-devolution) and Labour (post devolution). If we use the non-consistent series, the numbers are 62.71% and 85.7% respectively. Either way, previous administrations have failed to halt the drug deaths in Scotland and allowed them to increase at a far higher proportion than the SNP have, even though the SNP are shackled by the Misuse of Drugs Act being reserved.
Example being that the UK Government have already blocked plans by the SNP to set up a Drugs Room in Glasgow to try and start fixing this issue. Why would they block such an act of radical handling of Scotland’s drug death problem if they really cared about the deaths related to drugs use rather than SNP bad headlines?
Sorry Ross, but Scotland isn’t buying your lies anymore!
Sources
MacAlba 