Is This Right?

A worrying conversation overheard the other day has prompted me to bring the subject up here. A young man was complaining vociferously about having to appear in court in order to answer a charge of failing to keep a DIP appointment. He was basically saying that he didn't see why he had to keep any appointment because he didn't have a drug problem. This reminded me of similar instances that used to crop up when I was a Court Duty Officer a couple of years ago.

The Drug Intervention Programme has been running in my area for some time with people arrested on suspicion of having committed 'trigger offences' such as shoplifting being routinely tested for opiates at the police station. It is an offence to refuse the mouth swab test in the first place and if found to be positive for opiates, the person is given an appointment with a DIP worker, usually a day or two hence. This is a mandatory appointment and failure to attend is a criminal offence punishable by up to 3 months imprisonment. This is just one example of a whole host of new offences that were created by the last Labour government. 

Although the idea is laudable enough in trying to ensure that people with a drug addiction and who are committing acquisitive crimes in order to fund their habit are put into treatment as soon as possible, but there are a couple of problems with the operation of the scheme. The first is that the test is not very sophisticated and is quite likely to indicate positive for a wide range of painkillers taken legitimately for headache, 'flu or toothache. The second and more worrying in my view is when having tested positive, the police decide for what ever reason not to proceed with the original charges, but the DIP appointment is left in place.

I vividly recall listening to instances of people in just such a situation when they were surprised to find themselves in court having failed to keep the DIP appointment, but were facing no other charges. The offence is treated seriously by the courts and I've even been asked to conduct an interview for a Fast Delivery Report. But surely it cannot be right to end up in a situation where the so-called war on drugs is leading to the prosecution of some people who may not be drug  users at all or indeed even in possession of illegal drugs? As far as I know it is not yet an offence to be found under the influence of drugs.