Clause 1 - Aggravated supply of controlled drug
Drugs Bill
9:30 am
Mr John Mann (Bassetlaw, Labour)
I would like to make a few points about the clause, starting with the issue of changing the age from 18 to 16. I think that other Labour Members would raise the same issue. I suggest to the Minister that the issue of defining youth and adulthood goes much wider than the clause and that it will need much wider, cross-departmental attention in the next Parliament if we are to define more precisely the law as it applies to young people—to define their rights, responsibilities and obligations. Such a debate impinges in many ways on much of the legislation that we enact, and it would be helpful to define adulthood more clearly.
There is a consensus in the Committee, and probably in the House of Commons, that aggravated drug supply is a bad thing and should be punished more significantly. However, is there a notion that somehow there is a relationship with schools? In my view, that is a myth. If it were not, I would be the first to demand such action in the strongest possible terms. The questions that I have tabled and received written answers to demonstrate that, if anything, the trend in serious drug problems inside schools is downward.
Some of the anomalies in the clause highlight the problems. For example, if someone were to be convicted of aggravated drug supply for supplying drugs outside school, but not convicted of aggravated drug supply for supplying in the same place in the middle of the night, with certain drugs we could see the problem of syringe disposal in school playing fields. If a primary school were involved, such behaviour would seem to be the height of aggravated drug supply. That is the sort of problem that occasionally occurs in children's playgrounds in particular, which tend to be for young children, because that is precisely where older children and young adults tend to congregate.
If we were to look at where there is aggravated, extremely dangerous discarding of needles—although any discarding of needles is obviously dangerous—it would be in areas where young children might be. Of course, that could happen in a general playing field as well as a specific designated children's playing field. It seems to me that there is a potential inconsistency.
Another point is whether drug dealers wait outside the school gate. When I came into Parliament, I thought that that was the case. Two years ago, I thought that it was a major problem. More than 200 of my constituents wrote to me to tell me that it was a major problem. When I investigated, I found that it was a myth. Plenty of drugs were supplied, but the idea that the drug dealer would wait outside the school gate to pounce on the children coming out of the school was a myth, although it was one that was widely—