Meeting of the Parliament 13 January 2022
I thank the minister for bringing the debate to the chamber. I struggle to think of a more serious issue that we could discuss in Parliament. As colleagues have outlined, there were 1,339 avoidable drug-related deaths last year, and I fear that, without action, the number will increase again in the next set of figures.
I read the Government’s motion with interest, and I would struggle to disagree with much of it. It is probably fair to say that there is broad consensus on the measures that are needed to tackle the crisis. My concern is about the pace of the change that is required.
I intend to keep my remarks to the subject of what I believe is not the only but the single most important change that we could make, which is the introduction of overdose prevention sites. That will not come as a surprise to the minister, given our previous interactions and my personal experience of volunteering at the unofficial pilot project in Glasgow. I welcome the minister’s intention to take a revised proposal for an official pilot in the city to the Lord Advocate in due course.
Lots of questions are asked about whether overdose prevention sites can be established within the existing devolution settlement, whether they are effective and whether they will save lives. To put it simply, the answer to all those questions is yes. They can be established within the current devolution settlement, they are effective and they will save lives. How do I know? Because I have seen it at first hand. I volunteered with Peter Krykant, week in and week out, and I was never arrested or charged with any offence, meaning that such sites can clearly be established within the current legal framework. If they were illegal, I would have been lifted and charged, meaning that I likely would not have been standing here. The fact is that I was not.
I saw overdoses being reversed and more than a dozen lives being saved in front of my eyes, so I defy anyone in the chamber to tell me that overdose prevention sites do not work. The evidence is incontrovertible. I saw vulnerable young men and women who had been failed by many other aspects of the state being shown dignity, compassion and respect for the very first time, regardless of what traumas they had endured that led them to substance misuse.
It cannot be left to volunteers to fill the gap. As part of the unofficial pilot, Peter took into his care a 21-year-old girl who overdosed in front of him three times. She was sleeping in a tent in an alleyway in Glasgow because she had been sexually abused, and she was fearful of reaching out to any sort of care or official service because she had suffered so badly as a result of having done so previously. Peter frequently broke down because he was terrified that he would turn up the next day and she would be dead. That culminated in his being triggered—because he is a recovering addict—to the point where he relapsed and his own life was then at risk. I had to feel the fear that my friend potentially would not pick up the phone to me. That is a lived experience for hundreds, if not thousands, of Scots and it is something that we cannot tolerate any more. That was another learning experience from the unofficial pilot in Glasgow.
My heart breaks whenever I hear politicians from whatever side dismiss overdose prevention sites or, worse, hide behind constitutional grandstanding, because, every time that they do so, critical time is wasted.