Drug abuse and associated crime is a huge problem in the United Kingdom, as it is everywhere in the world. According to a position statement from the country's opposition Conservative Party, the UK's governing Labour Party government has taken the "just manage addiction" approach, rather than eliminate it through an aggressive national drug rehab program.

Managing drug addiction means placing opiate addicts (heroin, morphine, etc.) on state-provided substitute drugs, primarily methadone. An additional management approach which exists in several countries, and is being considered in the UK, are "safe injection sites" where addicts are provided with free syringes and a clean space where they can continue to use heroin or morphine without fear of arrest. In some countries, addicts are even given free heroin. Substitute drugs and free injection sites have shown to help reduce drug crime statistics, health care costs and the spread of disease from shared needles. But neither approach does anything to recover addicts' ruined lives through drug rehab programs, which is why it is called "managing drug addiction." Any drug rehab enrollments are often the result of a methadone clinic or safe site attendant taking a personal interest and initiative and talking an addict into entering drug rehab.

The Conservative party is promoting an alternative approach that would include expansion of drug police activities especially at the borders, enlarging the capacity of overcrowded prisons and jails, and greatly expanding the availability of drug rehab programs to actually help end addictions.

Commenting on the latest quarterly crime stats which show a 14 per cent increase in drug offenses, the Conservative's Shadow Home Secretary David Davis points out that Prime Minister Gordon Brown coined the phrase "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime" over a decade ago, but that drug abuse and crime statistics show the Labor government has "patently failed to deliver on their rhetoric. Drug abuse is not an isolated crime, it destroys lives, wrecks communities, fuels other crime and is a major cause of our broken society."

As insane as it sounds to reward addicts with more drugs who have managed to stay off drugs long enough to pass a urine test, this is what has happened in the UK, and what seems to have angered Davis the most.

"Spiraling drug abuse is a result of a . . . failed policy which needs putting right," Davis said. "[The Labor government is] part of the problem, not the solution. Today we learned that heroin and cocaine addicts on the government's treatment program are being given drugs as a reward for clean urine samples." In contrast to the government's policy of managing addiction, which means keeping people on drugs, Davis said his party would end addiction by expanding residential abstinence-based drug rehab programs. "We would stop, not swap, drug addictions," he said.

Davis promised that a Conservative government would establish a dedicated UK Border Police to stop illegal drugs "flowing in through our porous borders." He said he would put more police on the streets to catch and deter drug dealers, including expanded prison capacity "so offenders could actually be punished," adding that extra prison capacity would ensure that an addict sent to prison, rather than simply being shunted about while still on drugs, would be able to get off drugs through a successful drug rehab program.