Drug addiction figures in Perth and Kinross, particularly among prisoners, have been described as ”frightening”.
Information released by the Alcohol and Drugs Partnership shows that more than 80% of inmates entering Perth Prison over a six-month period tested positive for illegal substances, well above the Scottish average of 56%.
A further 18 outgoing prisoners more than a quarter of those tested provided positive samples when they were being liberated.
During a meeting of Perth and Kinross Council’s community safety committee, Councillor Heather Stewart highlighted the problem.
”This is hugely disappointing as the public rightly expect that the drug treatment programmes and the drug detection processes within our prisons are robust and that offenders should have the opportunity to deal with these issues while they are in detention,” she said.
”The Scottish Government drugs programme, which sees £38m a year being spent on methadone programmes as a means of addressing the problem, is clearly not working and it is time for us to step back and look for a way to address this growing problem.
”I am very concerned by these figures because it is not getting better it is getting worse.”
Head of community care John Gilruth suggested that the number of drug users in prison was so high because Perth now caters for a wider mix of inmates, with people from all over Scotland serving their sentence there.
A spokesman from the Scottish Prison Service added: ”The SPS has a robust policy on substance misuse within prisons. Those prisoners, however, reflect our society and 85% of prisoners on a methadone substitution prescription were initiated in the community.
”The prison management and various agencies are actively involved in tackling drug problems within the prison population.”
Concerns were also raised by Councillor Alexander Stewart, who said that both the council and Scottish Government were being faced with a ”very difficult” situation.
He continued: ”We cannot continue to throw vast sums of public money at this problem and not see positive outcomes.”
Although statistics contained in the report by the Alcohol and Drugs Partnership reveal that more than 1,000 people within Perth and Kinross are described as ”problem” users, this is still below the Tayside and Scottish average. The local authority area also has the second lowest drug death rate in the country.
The committee also heard that plans were in place to revisit the use of methadone in supporting recovery.
In a bid to make this work, Councillor Caroline Shiers called for a better support network for drug users and their families in battling addiction.
Photo by Julien Behal/PA Archive