ABOUT UKDPC
The UKDPC launched in April 2007 and our objectives are to:
- Provide independent and objective analysis of UK drug policy;
- Ensure this is used by UK governments when considering policy, and by the media and public to encourage a wider, informed debate.
The commission does not set out to make scientific assessments about the harm of any particular substance because other bodies including the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs and the new Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs do that.
What the commission seeks to do is identify and advocate better ways of making decisions about drug policy so that they are made consistently, with the best use of the evidence available.
When drugs represent such a significant burden to public health through disease, public order and social problems the commission believes policy can be improved by creating a simpler more effective drug policy framework – fit for our time - that will help to sort out the currently confused debates about drug policies in our country.
Over the next two years we will be commissioning research and collecting evidence about what works to shape a new framework so that good decisions – about drug prevention, control, enforcement and treatment – can be improved.
COMMISSIONERS
- Dame Ruth Runciman (Chair).
- Professor Baroness Haleh Afshar OBE
- Tracey Brown
- Professor Colin Blakemore FRS
- David Blakey CBE QPM
- Vivienne Parry
- Annette Dale-Perera
- Baroness Finlay of Llandaff
- Jeremy Hardie CBE
- Professor Alan Maynard OBE
- Adam Sampson
- Professor John Strang
- Dawn Austwick OBE (Observer).
TRUSTEES
- Jan King, Independent Consultant.
- Eric Appleby, Independent Consultant.
FULL-TIME STAFF
- Roger Howard is Chief Executive.
- Nicola Singleton is Director of Policy & Research.
- Victoria Silver is Head of Communications.
- Roderick Montgomery is Charity Administrator.
