HC Deb 14 March 1994 vol 239 cc502-3W
Mr. Flynn

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment he has made of the findings of the reports "Trends in the Cost Effectiveness of Enforcement Activity in the Illicit Heroin Market 1979–1990", published by the centre for health economics at York university; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Maclean

We shall be considering the report, which was published on 7 March 1994. Heroin trafficking is a clandestine activity and so, as the authors readily acknowledge, the report relies on many assumptions, estimates and crude measures of the effectiveness of enforcement. It is also debatable whether conclusions can be drawn about the effectiveness of drug enforcement from assumptions about the market in one particular drug.

In any case there have been significant developments in drug enforcement since the period covered by the report including improvements in the provision of drugs intelligence and the introduction by Customs of the new and successful flexible anti-smuggling teams.