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The Independent
04-06-2025
- General
- The Independent
No changes to drug laws even if consumption room is a success, says minister
The UK Government will not change drug laws to allow more safe consumption rooms, even if a Glasgow-based pilot is a success, a minister has said. The Thistle Centre opened earlier this year after a decade-long wrangle between the UK and Scottish governments, with the latter seeking an exemption from the Misuse of Drugs Act to ensure users of the facility are not prosecuted. Eventually, Scotland's top law officer ruled it would not be 'in the public interest' to seek to prosecute users of the service, which allows people to inject drugs, paving the way for it to open. Appearing before the Scottish Affairs Committee at Westminster on Wednesday, Home Office minister Dame Diana Johnson said the law will not be changed. Asked if the Government could rethink that stance if the Thistle proves to be a success in driving down Scotland's high drug death rates, the minister said: 'We look at evidence, we have experts, we have the ACMD (advisory council on the misuse of drugs) who offer advice, we look at evidence all the time. 'But I just really want to be clear with you, we do not support drug consumption facilities, it's not our policy and we will not be amending the Misuse of Drugs Act.' Liberal Democrat MP Angus MacDonald said his 'jaw just dropped open' at the minister's statement. 'If the Thistle turns out to be a great success within a year, I would be so excited about rolling that out everywhere,' he said. He added that it is 'the most wonderful way' of stopping people dying and can act as a pathway to rehabilitation. After the minister repeated the Government's stance, Mr MacDonald said: 'You're basically condemning thousands of people to death, in my opinion.' But Dame Diana rejected his assertion, saying: 'I don't accept that, with the greatest of respect. 'This is not the only thing that we can do to deal with drug misuse and I think the UK Government is very clear that there are a number of measures that can be used.' Labour MP Chris Murray also pointed out that it was Dame Diana who chaired the Home Affairs Select Committee which in 2023 released a report supporting a drug consumption room pilot. Picking up on that point, SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn questioned what evidence she had to have changed her view. 'Mr Flynn, you're a very experienced member of this House and you know that when a Member of Parliament becomes a minister, their personal views are irrelevant because they are there to represent the views of the Government,' she said. 'The recommendation that was made in that Home Affairs Select Committee report in the previous parliament was based on a group of politicians, cross-party, including your own party, that sat down and reached those recommendations together. 'That is very different to a Government policy that I am setting out today.'
Evening Standard
04-06-2025
- Health
- Evening Standard
No changes to drug laws even if consumption room is a success, says minister
Asked if the Government could rethink that stance if the Thistle proves to be a success in driving down Scotland's high drug death rates, the minister said: 'We look at evidence, we have experts, we have the ACMD (advisory council on the misuse of drugs) who offer advice, we look at evidence all the time.
Forbes
09-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
New U.S. Trade Agreements Could Grow The Economy
On May 8, 2025, the Trump Administration announced a new trade agreement between the United States and the United Kingdom. This initial pact should be a harbinger of additional 'win-win' American trade deals with the UK and other countries. Such agreements, besides reducing tariffs, could emphasize the mutual elimination of anticompetitive market distortions. Eliminating ACMDs would provide a far greater spur to economic growth than mere tariff reductions. The Agreement The May 8 U.S.-UK accord does far more than merely reduce some tariffs, (although significant tariff reductions in such areas as steel, aluminum, cars, beef, and pharmaceuticals are certainly beneficial). As trade expert Shanker Singham explains, the pact is a broader framework agreement that points toward future negotiations regarding: (1) free digital trade between the two nations; (2) coordination on foreign investment screening; and (3) the elimination of technical barriers to trade, which are a type of ACMD. The third category is particularly important. National requirements that imports must meet the same technical standards that are imposed on domestic producers are an especially pernicious sort of technical trade barrier. Future U.S.-UK agreement for the mutual recognition of technical standards would eliminate a serious barrier to numerous cross-border transactions. The paring back of additional ACMDs, through regulatory reforms in each country, could be the subject of additional U.S.-UK negotiations. In an April 2025 executive order, President Trump already committed to the unilateral rolling back of ACMDS embodied in anticompetitive federal regulations. The Agreement in Context The U.S.-UK pact is the first fruit of a new Trump trade strategy to use tariffs as an incentive to 'cut deals' with individual nations whose trade practices are seen as harmful to America. It reflects a negative Administration view of the approach taken in prior trade negotiations. U.S.-led Post World War II trade liberalization negotiations, under the General Agreement for Tariffs and Trade (and later the World Trade Organization), succeeded in reducing tariffs and various non-tariff barriers at the border. Unfortunately, however, they made little progress in dismantling+- ACMDs. ACMDs are internal ('behind the border') government-imposed regulations, policies, or practices that distort from open trade, competition on the merits, and property rights protections. They favor certain firms or industries, rather than letting competition and consumer choice drive outcomes. ACMDs have proliferated around the world, especially in the East Asian economies of Japan, Korea, and most notably China, driving their export-led growth models. These ACMDs have suppressed US exports and contributed to rising imports, which have led to excessive supply absorbed by the US consumer. ACMDs have also badly damaged the gross nationalpProduct per capita of the countries that engage in them. The Competere consulting firm, led by Shanker Singham, has developed an economic model (the ACMD model) to measure the GDP per capita impact of ACMDs. The econometric model evaluates the effects on GDP growth of three sets of legal policies {'pillars') that support a competitive, high-growth economy: property rights protection, domestic competition, and international competition. The model has been applied to assess GDP changes in multiple countries. Significantly, improving a country's ACMD index scores in domestic competition provides by far the largest boost to GDP per capita. Property right improvements come in second and international trade improvements (such as tariff reductions) come in third. That means getting rid of anticompetitive regulatory restrictions provides the 'biggest bang for the buck.' Implications for Trade Negotiations The implications of this model are clear. U.S. trade negotiators may want to use the carrot of American tariff reductions (coupled with the repeal of anticompetitive federal regulations) to achieve the elimination of significant foreign ACMDs. To the extent this strategy succeeds, higher economic growth should accompany new export opportunities for American firms. This would be an economic win-win for both the United States and its negotiating partners.
