Psychoactive Substances Bill [HL]

My Lords, it is wise to remind ourselves of what has been going on in relation to these substances in the past year or two. The system has been that, once a new substance is discovered, the procedures of the Misuse of Drugs Act have been used to add that substance to the prohibitions under that Act. It seems to me that the trouble with that is that it is very late in the day in relation to the emergence of the new substance. The purpose of this Bill, as I understand it, is to eliminate that particular difficulty and to make the provision operate in a general way so that you do not need to move, as in the past, during the emergence of a new psychoactive substance. So, that is what Parliament has been doing for some time. This seems to me to be a much better way to handle the problem than what has been available in the past.