Holyrood calls on Westminster to allow safe drugs room in Glasgow

Setting up a safe room for addicts to take drugs could “save lives'', Scotland's Public Health Minister has said.

Aileen Campbell made a fresh plea for the UK Government to back having such a centre in Glasgow.

She said having drugs policy reserved to Westminster meant the Scottish Government could not give the go ahead for a Safe Drugs Consumption Facility (SCDF) in the city.

There were 867 drugs deaths in Scotland in 2016 - a rise of 23% from the previous year - including 160 in Glasgow.

Against that backdrop Ms Cambell argued “bold ideas could be what makes the difference''.

She is due to raise the issue in a meeting with Home Office Minister Victoria Atkins next month, and ahead of that MSPs backed a Scottish Government motion calling for Westminster to “make the necessary changes to allow the introduction of a facility in Glasgow''.

Ms Campbell said: “Unfortunately at this time we are as a nation curtailed as to what we can do in response to the problems we face from substance use.

“However the existing situation in Glasgow is serious enough to warrant considering alternative approaches, including a supervised consumption room, and pushing for a change in the legislation to let this happen.

“There are SCDFs in over 70 cities around the world, but not a single one in the UK. And I would argue this position is no longer tenable.''

Glasgow City Council has already backed the creation of such a centre in a bid to help combat the current rise in HIV infections in the area.

The idea also has the support of Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish Greens.

But Glasgow Tory MSP Annie Wells said: “I fundamentally do not support the creation of such a facility.''

A safe drug consumption rood would “mask why we have reached this crisis point'', the Conservative claimed, as she told how she had lost friends because of drug abuse.

“Growing up and still living in one of the most deprived areas of Glasgow, I know only too well what drug addiction can do,'' she said.

“Last year leaving my flat I saw emergency services in my street only to find out a former friend of mine had died because of drugs. I grew up with this guy, we played together.

“Many years ago I lost a close friend to a drugs overdose also, a young woman with a child, who again I had grown up with, known my whole life.

“She was such a lovely girl and although we had grown apart her death and the impact it had on her family has stayed with me to this very day.

“That is why I am so passionate we work first and foremost in getting people off drugs altogether.''

Ms Campbell stressed the government's drug strategy was still one “where all our treatment and rehabilitation services are based on the principle of recovery''.

But she said: “For some people that possibility of recovery or abstinence is a long way off, and in the meantime it is important we focus on keeping them alive and in touch with those services which may require them with the support they require to eventually take those further steps towards their own recovery.''

Labour's Anas Sarwar said while one drugs room in one city would not be “an adequate response to Scotland's drugs problem'', such a facility “could well have a part to play''.

He added: “We believe if necessary powers should be devolved if all other avenues have been exhausted.''

But he also hit out at the Scottish Government, accusing ministers of cutting funding to those working with drug addicts