Drugs (Hansard, 20 February 1992)

§ 13. Mr. McFall
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what information on drug shipments and drug seizures from illegal traffic from European countries and from other countries is shared with United Kingdom, European countries and other interested organisations.

§ Mr. John Patten
Responsibility for combating drug trafficking is shared between Her Majesty's Custom and Excise and the police service. There are close and developing links with other European countries and elsewhere. In some of those countries, those links are enhanced by the posting or exchange of drugs liaison officers. Effective exchange of information is essential, and we devote considerable efforts to that. The United Kingdom also plays a full role in the work of international organisations—in particular, Interpol and the Customs Co-operation Council.

§ Mr. McFall
I am sure that the Minister will congratulate Customs and Excise on the record seizures of drugs that it has undertaken. Nevertheless, heroin is still coming into this country at an increasing rate, and something must be done to control it. In view of the recent "Dispatches" television programme, has the Minister conducted an inquiry into how the police, Customs and Excise and the security services work together and how they share information with other countries so as to reduce the hard drugs problem that each and every hon. Member sees weekly in his or her constituency?

§ Mr. Patten
I agree that it is a serious problem—and not, I hope, one for party political debate. I assure the hon. Gentleman that co-operation between the services—customs and the police at frontiers and at ports of entry —is very close indeed. Her Majesty's Government are doing all that they possibly can to cut off overland supplies of heroin, in particular, coming along the so-called Balkan route. In the next few months, with British taxpayers' money, we shall be setting up a national drugs intelligence unit in Czechoslovakia to try to intercept drugs coming overland. We hope shortly to do the same in Hungary.

§ Mr. Soames
Would it not be a good idea if the airlines, when checking in passengers in those countries from which large quantities of drugs come to this country, were to hand each passenger a paper in his or her own language clearly explaining that if they bring drugs into the United Kingdom they are likely to be caught and, if they are caught, they are likely to go away for a very long time indeed?

§ Mr. Patten
That is an interesting thought from my hon. Friend and I shall pursue it. The effect on anyone flying into Kuala Lumpur and hearing a Malaysian Airlines hostess saying, "You are about to land in Kuala Lumpur: if you bring drugs into our country, the penalty 449 is death by hanging" must be very salutary indeed. We do not have that penalty, but we have life imprisonment—which means between 20 to 30 years in the case of some of those convicted in the most serious cases. The notice to which my hon. Friend referred is a very good idea indeed.

§ Mr. Sheerman
The Minister of State—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where is the shadow Home Secretary?"] My right hon. Friend is presenting awards at an important lunch. The Minister of State does not want to make this a political issue, but I want to make two important political points. It is all very well for the Government to pretend to mount a campaign against drugs and drug imports, but at the same time they have allowed another Department, the Treasury—[Interruption.] Conservative Members do not want to hear—to cut 400 customs officer jobs. Customs officers are the front-line troops. They are the people who stop drugs flowing into Britain. The Government have also allowed the Port of London police to be privatised What does that do for the campaign against drug imports?

§ Mr. Patten
What a rant—the hon. Gentleman gives his well-known imitation of the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott), but without the charm and lightness of touch. The Government are spending about half a billion pounds per year dealing with the serious international problems caused by drug traffickers trying to bring drugs into Britain. I would hope for a little bipartisan support for the sort of work done, for example, by our drugs liaison officers abroad, who have brought about such successful seizures of heroin and other drugs in recent months.