Subj: UK: Pressure grows on Hellawell over drug rise



Date: 17 Feb, 2000



Source: Times, The (UK)







Pressure grows on Hellawell over drug rise

BY RICHARD FORD, HOME CORRESPONDENT



KEITH HELLAWELL, the Government's anti-drugs co-ordinator,

denied yesterday that his strategy was failing as new

figures showed a rise in the number of drugs-related

offenders.



Mr Hellawell held talks with the Prime Minister at Downing

Street after weeks of damaging speculation in Whitehall that

have undermined his position.



As he met the Prime Minister to discuss the ten-year anti-

drugs strategy, Government figures showed that almost

128,000 people were convicted of a drugs offence in in 1998,

a rise of 13 per cent on 1997. In 1988 only 35,000 people

were convicted of a drugs offence.



The number of seizures of cocaine rose by one quarter to

5,000 and heroin by 19 per cent to 14,900. However, the

increase in seizures may only be a reflection of there being

many more drugs being available to seize.



Mr Hellawell, the former Chief Constable of West Yorkshire,

has been on the defensive all year as the Whitehall rumour

mill claimed that ministers had lost faith in his abilities.



His biggest difficulty has been that he hates being labelled

a "drugs czar", with its implications of an all-powerful

figure. He never uses the term himself, preferring the title

UK anti-drugs co-ordinator.



He was given the task of producing a ten-year plan to combat

the use of drugs. A strategy was published last year, which

set, for the first time, a series of targets.



The proportion of people aged 16 to 25 using cocaine and

heroin is to be cut in half by 2008 and by 25 per cent in

2003; the number of 11 to 16-year-olds using Class A drugs

is to cut by 20 per cent by 2002. Other targets include

reducing repeat offending by drug-using criminals by half by

2008 and by 25 per cent by 2005.



The targets were rendered almost meaningless, however, as no

baseline figures were in the plan because the Government

claimed that existing statistics were inadequate. Observers

also noted that many of the targets were set for after the

next general election and after the end of Mr Hellawell's

three-year contract, which ends in January 2001.



The strategy also concentrates on the most harmful drugs,

such as cocaine and heroin, with the implication that there

is less concentration of softer drugs, which is not

something that the Government wants to shout about for fear

of upsetting middle England.



Yesterday, after meeting the Prime Minister, Mr Hellawell

said: "We are concentrating on the drugs that cause most

harm, though this does not mean we are going soft on

cannabis."