I am trying to be helpful by responding particularly to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, who asked what we were doing on evaluation.
I have not consulted officials—perhaps they will be waiting for me in the corridor afterwards to tell me—but it seems to me sensible and appropriate to reflect the concerns expressed in this debate on how we evaluate.
9.45 pm
As to more effective evaluation, we have again listened to comments made in Committee and have committed to post-legislative scrutiny after 30 months. I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, will accept that one of the problems—we heard this at the meeting we had—is the quality of data as to what works and what does not. It is like the old argument, whoever it was that said it, that half their advertising budget was wasted—the only problem was that they could not work out which half. It is one of the challenges that we have. We will have post-legislative scrutiny of the effect of the Bill after 30 months and we hope to draw some conclusions about the level of usage.
The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, was uncharacteristically a little uncharitable about the Home Secretary’s response, which was sent within a matter of days. It was a substantive response which included the additional element that,
“we have recently refreshed our over-arching approach to reducing the demand for drugs, in line with the evidence-base set out by the ACMD, enabling us to take a broad approach to prevention”.
This is reflected in the wider use of social media and questioning, which allows young people to go online, raise questions themselves and have them answered by others. It has been found on the evidence that that tends to be a more effective way of communicating with young people, rather than figures of authority telling them, “This is the way that it should be”, or even former drug users talking about the dangers for them. From the evidence that was presented at the meeting and in the response, this kind of peer-to-peer interaction on social media, which FRANK does very well—FRANK being the website—might provide a way forward for the future.
Given the two undertakings—post-legislative scrutiny in 30 months and a significant section addressing the effectiveness of prevention and education—and the commitment to write to the cross-government group asking it to reflect on the debate we are having here about new psychoactive substances in its future annual report, I hope the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.