Scientists versus Politicans

The problem with being interested in politics and current affairs is this nasty habit it has of never stopping. It might be a slow news day but you can bet that somewhere in the world there is something of interest going on.

Which is why I am still up at quarter to one on a Tuesday morning after doing research into the Professor Nutt sacking debacle. It's caused some amount of disquiet and it looks like its going to get uglier as the week goes on. Two other members of the ACMD, (Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs) have resigned in protest and more may follow. It's scientists on one side and politicians on the other.

For those who might not have been following the case here is a bit of background. Professor David Nutt, (who works both at the University of Bristol and Imperial College, London) last week gave a lecture at Imperial College stating both alcohol and tobacco were more deadly than many illegal drugs. You can also read his paper on the subject here.

Days later Professor Nutt was rather unceremoniously sacked by an email from Home Secretary Alan Johnson. Ouch.

Alan Johnson's decision sparked off fighting both within the government as well as out as Lord Drayson: the science and innovation minister who has overall responsibility for all scientific advice given to the government went nuclear at being left out and initially sided with Professor Nutt. One email message read "Alan did this without letting me know and giving me a chance to persuade him it's a big mistake. Is Gordon able to get Alan to undo this? As 'science champion in Government', I can't just stand aside on this one."

Unfortunately for David Nutt this stance didn't last long and Lord Drayson sided with the Government after Prime Minister Gordon Brown stepped into the fray stating that he had received reassurances from Alan Johnson and that his earlier response had been an initial reaction.

But is there any truth to what Professor Nutt says? Well lets look at some statistics for deaths in Scotland and see what it looks like.

In Scotland there were 574 drug-related deaths in 2008, but we need to be careful as these figures also include alcohol as a drug but strangely not tobacco, cannabis or LSD.

Breaking that figure down makes it appear like this:

Heroin/Morphine-336
Methadone- 181
Total of all Benzodiazepine related deaths- 364
Diazapam- 317
Temazapam- 12
Cocaine- 79
Ecstasy- 7
Amphetamines- 12
Alcohol- 273

Unfortunately as far as I can find there are no similar figures regarding tobacco related deaths for 2008 so we have to make do with 2004.

In 2004, there were almost 13,500 smoking-related deaths in Scotland - over 1 in 5 of all deaths.

That would make it appear however that David Nutt is vindicated and that deaths related to Alcohol and Tobacco vastly outweigh deaths due to drugs. With that in mind and the fact that and advice given to a government is never free lets take a look at how much the ACMD has cost for advice that was ultimately ignored. Here is a parliamentary question from last year regarding the committee's finances.

Home Department
Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs: Finance

James Brokenshire: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how much her Department spent to support the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs in each of the last five years. [223151]

Mr. Coaker [holding answer 10 September 2008]: The Home Office allocated the following sums of money in each of the last five years to support the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs:

Sum allocated to the ACMD (£)

2003-04 £80,000

2004-05 £135,000

2005-06 £165,000

2006-07 £152,000

2007-08 £152,800

In addition the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs secretariat staff and other civil servant costs have not been allocated as such costs are subsumed within normal salaried remuneration and within existing budgets.

29 Sep 2008 : Column 2314W

So in total the ACMD has cost the taxpayer well over half a million pounds over 5 years if my rather poor maths skills are right. That's a lot of money for a group of advisors whose advice and recommendations you are going to ignore...



Perhaps after being very public in his outburst Professor David Nutt should have expected a very public response that might have been as embarrassing to him as his recommendations were to the government. Rest assured we will be working to have him on the show and ask him personally over the next couple of weeks.