Developments in Europe’s anti-drug laws

The EU Drugs Agency’s (EMCDDA) Annual Report for 2012 has highlighted a variety of measures that are being developed by countries to reduce the demand for, and supply of, new drugs. This includes legislative and enforcement changes.

The report reveals that Europe is faced with an increasingly complex stimulant market, in which consumers are confronted with a wide variety of powders and pills.

The speed at which new psychoactive substances can appear and be distributed challenges countries’ established legislative procedures for drug control. The Annual report describes how several countries have responded with ‘innovative changes to their legislation or enforcement policies’.

The main trend in many countries appears to be to focus on penalising supply rather than use:

• Ireland (2010), Romania (2011) and Austria (2012) have introduced new criminal laws penalising the unauthorised distribution, sale or advertising of new psychoactive substances.

• Other countries have modified existing laws to strengthen or speed up drug control procedures. Poland (2010), for example, has modified its drug law to prohibit the distribution of new substances, while Hungary (2010) and Finland (2011) have set up risk-assessment panels to inform decision-making.

• In 2011 and 2012 respectively, the UK and Hungary enacted new procedures, becoming the latest countries to bring in ‘temporary controls’ on a substance. These controls are introduced pending further consideration of the harms associated with the drug concerned and a decision on permanent sanctions.

But drug laws are not the only means used to meet the challenges posed by these new substances. Countries are also turning to their medicines and consumer safety laws, for example, to tackle the issue.

Consumer safety regulations requiring that goods on sale are accurately labelled in relation to their expected use have been invoked to confiscate ‘Spice’ products in Italy, and mephedrone labelled as ‘bath salts’ and ‘plant food’ in the UK (before mephedrone was controlled under the country’s drug law).

Looking to the future, the European Commission, supported by the EU Member States, the EMCDDA, Europol and the European Medicines Agency is working on new legislation to better address the emergence of new psychoactive substances in the EU, says the report.