Write a 4 pages paper on drug legislation. The key objective of this strategy is to reduce the number of 25 year olds using illegal drugs in the last month and previous year. Due to contextual influences the government had to provide education about drug prevention as a service provision in prisons and schools across the Country. Books and literature about drug abuse would be provided freely. This was hoped to reduce drug abuse amongst young people and educate them about the dangers of drugs.

Write a 4 pages paper on drug legislation. The key objective of this strategy is to reduce the number of 25 year olds using illegal drugs in the last month and previous year. Due to contextual influences the government had to provide education about drug prevention as a service provision in prisons and schools across the Country. Books and literature about drug abuse would be provided freely. This was hoped to reduce drug abuse amongst young people and educate them about the dangers of drugs.

The government had important objectives that they wanted to target as a result of contextual influences where drug abuse was present. The objectives the government hoped to achieve included. Reducing levels of repeat offending amongst drug offenders, increase participation of problematic drug abusers’, include prisoners’ in drug treatment programmes that have a positive impact on health and crime. They also wanted to reduce access to drugs amongst 5 – 16 year olds.

The current legislative framework that shapes service provision is “The 2005 Drugs Act” that has a number of stated aims including the enhancement of Police and Court powers against drug offenders by the creation of a new presumption of intent to supply where a defendant is found to be in possession of a certain quantity of controlled drugs (http://drugs.homeoffice.gov.uk/drugs-laws/drug-act-2005/). This Act came into force on 1st January 2006.

Reflecting critically I can see a problem with this framework, whilst it provides a legal statement for the police and court. it leaves an air of confusion where the issue of quantity is questioned. For example, how much of an illegal drug does a person need to be in possession of for it to be a criminal offence Legal frameworks must be clear to enable service provision to run smoothly and avoid criminals’ taking advantage of them.

“United States Office of National Drug Control Strategy” and “United Nations International Drug Control Programme.” Explain that the world annual population prevalence rate for illegal drug use is around 3%-4%. World population totals for the use of heroin and cocaine are estimated at 8 and 13.3 million adults. (M, Ramsay and S Partridge) Explain that, In England and Wales, population survey data suggest that around 50% of people aged 16-29 have used an illegal drug on at least one occasion (with the majority having used cannabis) and approximately 1.2 million people aged 16-24 have consumed an illegal drug in the past month.

Reflecting critically on this evidence, service provision must be shaped to combat the increasing numbers of drug abusers’ in the world today. A critical analysis of these figures show that the world is facing a drug abuse epidemic if we don’t act soon we won’t have the facilities to cope. If service provision is not shaped to handle the contextual influences of growing drug problems then we have little chance of succeeding. The government have been forced to act and implement strategies to fight the growing drug problems. In hindsight the government could have done a lot more if they had acted sooner. We have to look at the contextual influences such as, warning signs without burying our heads in the sand. if we bury our heads in the sand then the problems get ignored, explode and become bigger.