Letters_ts@scotsman.com

Website: http://www.scotsman.com/

By Jenny Booth

SCOTTISH PRISONS TO STAY TOUGH ON CANNABIS

Scotish prison governors will not be ordered to take a more lenient view of prisoners who smoke cannabis in their cells, despite Home Office guidance to prison governors south of the Border.

The Home Office prisons minister, George Howarth, yesterday announced that mandatory drug testing was to be halved in English jails, and governors urged to discriminate between cannabis smokers and heroin injectors and other hard drug users.

The switch of focus from "soft" to "hard" drugs in the new Prison Service drugs strategy only refelcted what was happening in the wider community, said Mr Howarth. "The law outside prisons recognises that cannabis is a less serious problem than, for instance, heroin and cocaine, and we are simply refelcting that.

"We do still accept that prisoners who use cannabis are breaking the law and they will be treated accordingly, but we are reflecting the way world is outside prisons."

Until now, 10 per cent of the English and Welsh prison population has been chosen at random each month and asked to give a urine sample for mandatory drug testing (MDT). In the three years that MDT has been in place, the number of prisoners testing positive for any drug has fallen from 40 per cent to 20 per cent.

Now, the 5.5 million a year MDT programme is to be halved to 5 per cent of prisoners a month, and governors urged to clamp down on inmates suspected of using hard drugs. "We believe that, by more tightly targeting groups where we believe there is a serious problem and steering tests in their direction, we are more likely to solve the serious problems," said Mr Howarth.

Savings in the prison anti-drugs budget would be used to develop more drug treatment facilities and provide more drug-free accommodation in prisons. Area anti-drugs co-ordinators would be appointed to pool resources between prisons.