Crack Cocaine in London - Canadian Harm Reduction Network

CRACK COCAINE IN 

LONDON 

Qualitative research focussing 

on Brent, Camden, Lambeth 

and Westminster 

REPORT 

COI Communications Job # 255424 

Prepared for: 

COI 

Hercules House 

Hercules Road 

London 

SE1 7DU 

And: 

The Home Office 

Queen’ Anne’s Gate 

SW1H 9AT 

September 2003 

439 report 

Contact at Cragg Ross Dawson: Arnold Cragg

CONTENTS 

Page number 

A. BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES 1 

B. METHODOLOGY AND SAMPLE 3 

1. Desk research 3 

2. Field research 3 

C. SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS 6 

Background on crack 6 

Why is crack a serious problem? 7 

Cocaine and crack 8 

Crack houses 9 

Communications about crack 10 

Crack markets 12 

Enforcement 13 

Treatment 14 

Views of residents 16 

D. CONCLUSIONS 18 

E. FINDINGS IN DETAIL 20 

1. Crack: the apparent scale of the problem 20 

2. Who uses crack and why? 24 

2.1 In general 24 

2.2 Poly-drug use 30 

3. Why is crack singled out as a serious problem 32 

4. Crack and cocaine 39 

5. Crack houses 40 

5.1 What are they 40 

5.2 How crack houses develop 44 

5.3 The problems associated with crack houses 46 

5.4 Closing crack houses; policies, difficulties, benefits 49 

6. Communications between the authorities 

and the public about crack 54 

7. Crack prices and markets 62 

8. Issues around enforcement 67 

8.1 What’s being tried, what recommended 67 

8.2 Limitations of enforcement, prevention 74 

8.3 The US experience 81 

9. Treatment 82 

9.1 Impediments to seeking or getting treatment 82 

9.2 What is treatment 85 

9.3 What are crack users up against 

in trying to stop using 89 

9.4 How much confidence is there in treatment? 93 

9.5 How might treatment be improved? 96 

CRAGG ROSS DAWSON CRACK HOUSES 10-02-03 

RESEARCH PROPOSALS

CONTENTS continued 

Page number 

10. Residents’ perceptions of crack as a problem 98 

10.1 Brent 98 

10.1.1 Living in Harlesden and Stonebridge 98 

10.1.2 Crime and law enforcement 101 

10.1.3 Awareness of crack and other drugs 102 

10.1.4 Crack houses 104 

10.1.5 Communications between public and 

police about crack 105 

10.2 Camden 

10.2.1 Living in the Camden High Street 

Clarence Way area 106 






10.3 Lambeth 

10.3.1 Living in Brixton and Streatham 114 






10.4 Westminster 

10.4.1 Living in Lisson Green Estate 125 






CRAGG ROSS DAWSON CRACK HOUSES 10-02-03 

RESEARCH PROPOSALS

1 

A. BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES 

The prevalence of crack cocaine appears to have been increasing 

since the early 1990s. Users are increasingly prominent on the streets 

in certain areas. The rise of crack houses to accommodate purchase 

and consumption has led to increased anti-social behaviour: the 

frequenting of premises by sex workers; criminal damage to property; 

acquisitive and violent crime in the immediate vicinity; noise and other 

forms of nuisance. These effects have, in turn, led, in some areas, to 

increasing impatience on the part of the public that something effective 

be done about crack. 

DPAS (Drugs Prevention Advisory Service) London wishes to 

commission a study to explore the problem of crack and look 

particularly at what potential there may be for communication 

campaigns to strengthen local communities in resisting drug dealing 

and use. 

The study reported in this document included desk research and new 

fieldwork. 

The desk research was devoted to exploring the problem of crack, and 

how this problem is being tackled 

• demographics of crack cocaine users 

• penalties to individuals and communities of crack use 

• nature of role of crack houses 

• nature of treatment and beliefs about what works 

• planned and current initiatives for tackling problematic crack 

cocaine use 

CRAGG ROSS DAWSON CRACK IN LONDON SEPTEMBER 03 

DRAFT RESEARCH REPORT

2 

The new fieldwork had two primary aims: 

• to examine how professionals involved (in a variety of roles) 

with crack users, or with the consequences of crack use, 

perceive the nature of the problem 

• to examine how residents living in areas where there is a lot of 

crack use perceive the problem and the authorities’ attempts to 

overcome it 

In addition, the fieldwork sought to examine what contribution the 

public, and certain professionals, could make to more effective police 

and local authority action against crack houses if they were… 

• better informed about the signs which may give early warning of 

a crack house developing 

• more confident that effective use is made of information they 

give to the authorities about drugs 



3 

B. METHODOLOGY & SAMPLE 

1. Desk research 

The desk research examined a wide variety of documents and 

websites, aiming to gather information on… 

• what is currently believed to be the extent of crack use in the UK 

• the geographical distribution of the crack problem in the UK 

• what are believed to be the underlying causes of increasing 

crack use 

• the range of penalties for society generally, and high crack 

areas specifically, which flow from crack use 

• what initiatives have been tried, in the UK and elsewhere, to 

reduce crack use or mitigate the harm associated with use 

• what treatment services are available for crack users and what 

is known about how successful they are in getting people off 

crack 

• how experts in the field see the future and what they advise in 

relation to dealing with crack 

A list of sources consulted for the desk research will be found at the 

end of this report. 

2. Field research 

The fieldwork for this study consisted of individual interviews with 

professionals, and group discussions and paired interviews with 

residents. 



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Professionals 

25 individual interviews were conducted with professionals involved 

with a variety of different aspects of crack as a social problem. These 

interviews were with the following. 

GLA (Greater London Authority) drugs policy advisor 

Drugs specialist, Metropolitan Police 

DAT (Drug Action Team) members in Brent, Camden, Lambeth 

and Westminster (5 interviews) 

Addaction Project Manager, Brent 

Addaction Crack Worker, Brent 

Crisis Services Officer, drug treatment centre, Central London 

Involved resident, Camden 

Anti-Social Behaviour Team, Camden 

Tenant’s Association Chair, Camden 

Crack specialist, London DAT 

Community Drug Education Project, Lambeth 

Police Liaison Officer, Lambeth 

Police Sergeant, Intelligence Unit, Lambeth 

Community Safety Officer, Lambeth 

Organiser, Crime Forum, Lambeth 

Manager, drug treatment centre, Westminster 

Needle exchange, Westminster 

Community Housing Officer, Camden/Westminster 

Divisional Intelligence Unit, MPS, Westminster 

Detective Chief Inspector, Westminster 

Community Policeman, Westminster 

The ground covered in these interviews of course varied depending on 

the role and expertise of each respondent. In each case we were 

concerned to learn as much as we could about how the problem of 

crack was viewed, and where the respondent saw scope for more 

effective interventions. Interviews were variable in length, with an 

average duration of over one hour. The uneven distribution across the 

four boroughs was not originally intended but resulted from networking 

from one respondent to another, together with some accidents of 

availability. 

Residents 

Ten group discussions and ten paired interviews were conducted with 

residents of the four boroughs visited for the research. 



5 

Group 1, under 50s, parents, Brent 

Group 2, over 50s, Brent 

Paired interview 1, M, F, 40s Brent 


(Brent respondents lived in either Stonebridge or Harlesden.) 

Group 3, 20s and 30s, Camden 

Group 4, over 50s, Camden 

Paired interview 3, M, F, 60s, Camden 

Paired interview 4, F, F, 70s, Camden 

(Camden respondents lived close to Camden High Street or Clarendon 

Way) 

Group 5, African Caribbean (participants in Crime Forum project), 

Lambeth 

Group 6, 20s and 30s, Lambeth 

Paired interview 5, M, F, 30s, Lambeth 

Paired interview 6, F 30s, F 40s, Lambeth 

(Respondents in Group 5 lived in a wide variety of locations within 

Lambeth, including Brixton. Respondents in Group 6 lived in the 

Streatham Hill, Tulse Hill area.) 

Group 7, 20s and 30s, Westminster 

Group 8, 20s – 50s, Westminster 


Group 10, (included Chair of TA), 50s, Westminster 

Paired interview 7, F, F, 60s, Westminster 

Paired interview 8, M, M, 50s, Westminster 

Paired interview 9, M, F, 30s, Westminster 


(Westminster respondents all lived on, or in the vicinity of the Lisson 

Green Estate.) 

Discussions lasted on average a little less than 90 minutes, and 

interviews about 60 minutes. Respondents were asked about life in 

their neighbourhoods⎯good things and bad things. There was 

discussion of crime and law enforcement, and of the impact of drug 

taking on the area. Respondents were asked for their views on drugs: 

on their prevalence, on measures to combat them, what might be done 

that was not being done. Attention focussed increasingly on crack 

specifically: were respondents aware of crack use? were they aware of 

crack houses? did they have any knowledge of how the authorities 

were reacting to crack use, and crack houses? might they get in touch 

with the police if they became aware of crack dealing, or a crack 

house? 



6 

C. SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS 

Background on crack 

1. Most people who are professionally concerned with drug abuse believe 

that crack use continues to grow. There are probably at least ten times 

more cocaine users than crack users, but crack use is more 

compulsive; a typical crack user will spend significantly more on crack 

than a typical cocaine user on cocaine. Compulsive use generates a 

need for money that is met by crime or sex work. Data from arrest 

referrals and urine testing confirm that crack users commit crime 

disproportionately to their numbers. 

2. Crack is a problem in London and most other major conurbations in 

England. It appears to be a growing problem in smaller towns and in 

some rural areas also. Use concentrates particularly in areas around 

known drug markets, for example, in London, Brixton, Camden Town, 

and Soho. 

3. Most crack users in London are white, and most white crack users also 

use heroin, very often injecting both drugs. Black and other BME 

groups are more likely to use a pipe than to inject crack. Many white 

users have a long history of serious drug abuse. This is less often true 

of black users, some of whom migrate from cannabis. There appears 

to be little data on age: anecdotally, some sex workers, said to be 

dependent on crack, are very young, but there are many crack users in 

their late 30s and 40s. 

4. Crack delivers a very rapid and intense high (‘excited delirium’) 

followed by a commensurately unpleasant comedown. Users seek to 

regain the high and avoid the comedown by retaking. This produces a 

binge pattern of consumption; many users will continue to use, often 

over a period of days, until they have no more crack, no means of 

obtaining any, and/or are physically exhausted. 

5. The fact that many heroin users have started to use crack is a major 

reason why crack use has grown as much as it has in London. Heroin 

users are attracted to crack in part because it delivers a feeling of 



7 

euphoria; habituation has meant that they take heroin to avoid feeling ill 

rather than because they enjoy the effects. Some heroin users appear 

to feel that crack is less harmful than heroin, and may take crack as a 

means of reducing their heroin consumption. Crack users are attracted 

to heroin because it mitigates the comedown and is conducive to a less 

frantic, more relaxed pattern of use. Alcohol performs a similar role for 

some crack users and it is not unusual for them to develop alcohol 

dependence. 

6. Crack use correlates, as does all problematic drug use, with 

deprivation and social exclusion. There are some who think that the 

pleasurable effects of crack precipitate and sustain use to a greater 

extent than is the case with heroin⎯people are ‘pulled in’ by wanting 

the effects as well as ‘pushed in’ by difficulties in their lives. There are 

certainly some ‘recreational’, non-dependent, users but no one knows 

how many. Many people are sceptical about recreational use because 

crack is so compulsive. Crack is believed to cause serious disruption 

in people’s lives more quickly and predictably than heroin does. 

Why is crack a serious problem? 

7. Crack has been made the subject of a National Plan, 37 DAT areas 

have been designated High Crack Areas (HCAs) and required to 

submit ‘Crack Returns’. This degree of attention reflects the harm 

associated with crack. 

• users are not satiated; they want to go on using as long as they 

can 

• the consequent binge pattern of use produces crime binges and 

insistent prostitution 

• the effects of the drug make users audacious and more likely to 

be aggressive 

• crack dealing is very profitable (because users come back 

quickly) and there is, in some areas, a culture of violence around 

crack dealing 



8 

• crack users get physically and mentally ill; they do not eat or 

sleep properly and they are liable to suffer from anxiety and 

paranoia 

• injecting crack users move quickly to injecting in the groin, in 

part because they are disinhibited, in part because they inject so 

often they ‘use up’ their other veins; groin injectors cause 

particular offence when they inject in public 

• crack users are often conspicuous on the streets and contribute 

disproportionately to public fear that drug use is escalating out of 

control 

Cocaine and crack 

8. Cocaine rather than crack is brought into the UK. There are many 

more cocaine users than crack users. Currently the two markets 

appear to be quite distinct: crack dealers do not sell cocaine and vice 

versa. For most of its users cocaine is a fashionable, get-dressed-upand-go-out 

drug for pubs and clubs, whereas crack has a much dirtier, 

more desperate, street image. 

9. Some professionals fear that significant numbers of recreational 

cocaine users will be tempted at some point to try crack and will not be 

able to resist its compulsiveness. It is not difficult to turn cocaine into 

crack. Currently it would appear to be distribution factors, and highly 

negative imagery, that keep cocaine users away from crack. But both 

drugs are of course stimulants and the difference between their effects 

is one of degree. Crack is much more intense; the means of delivery 

(smoking or injecting) produces a more rapid and vivid effect than does 

snorting. There is no evidence on this but it is possible that migration 

from cocaine to crack may eventually be encouraged by dealers; 

dealing crack is probably more profitable because turnover is more 

rapid (although deals are also smaller). 



9 

Crack houses 

10. ‘Crack houses’ arise in localities where there is a lot of crack use. 

They are residential premises where users can go to smoke or inject. 

In some areas, dealers operate from crack houses and users go there 

to buy crack (and other drugs) as well as to use. In other areas, crack 

is bought from street dealers in nearby markets and the house is 

primarily a place to use. Some crack users rarely or never use crack 

houses and it is not clear to what degree crack use would abate if all 

crack houses were successfully closed. 

11. Typically, crack houses develop when users and/or dealers take over 

the accommodation of ‘a vulnerable person’. The vulnerable person 

may have mental or physical handicaps, or he/she may be a drug user. 

The degree to which the legal tenant of a crack house is accurately 

regarded as an innocent victim varies enormously. 

12. Crack houses develop for a number of reasons: crack produces 

cravings and users are often in a great hurry to use; many crack users 

are homeless and need somewhere to be; crack is a stimulant and 

crack users look for social activity in a way that heroin users do not; 

some female crack users sell sex and a crack house provides a venue 

for this. 

13. Having a crack house in the neighbourhood usually means that 

mugging and burglary increase as users generate funds to buy crack. 

In addition, crack houses often cause severe aggravation to 

neighbouring residents: there are constant comings and goings day 

and night; users are an intimidating presence on the street; there may 

be aggressive propositioning by sex workers; there is likely to be noise 

and litter, including discarded needles. 

14. The public complains about crack houses and the authorities try and 

close them as quickly as they can. This almost invariably takes longer 

than seems reasonable to those who complain, but the delay generally 

results from respecting the law rather than inertia or inefficiency. The 

core difficulty is providing the sort of evidence that will justify eviction. 

Closure is quicker and easier if the legal tenant agrees to be 



10 

temporarily rehoused elsewhere, and if the police do not intend to bring 

charges for dealing, which requires evidence that is difficult and timeconsuming 

to collect. RBKC (Royal Borough of Kensington and 

Chelsea) have established a protocol for closing crack houses that has 

been adopted in whole or part by some other boroughs. Under the 

protocol the goal is to close crack houses within 42 days. Camden is 

enthusiastic about ASBOs (Anti-Social Behaviour Orders) as an 

alternative to the sort of injunctions that are often needed to close a 

crack house. 

15. The term ‘crack house’, widely used in the media and by the 

authorities, is regarded by some as unfortunate. In their view, by 

obscuring the human dimension, it depersonalises the problem and 

places the emphasis unhelpfully on enforcement rather than prevention 

or treatment. On the other hand, there is no doubt that residents in 

neighbourhoods blighted by crack demand action against crack 

houses. Closing crack houses is one way the authorities can 

demonstrate that they care about the problem and are doing something 

about it. 

Communications about crack 

16. The position of many residents in high crack areas is that they inform 

the authorities about crack houses and other problems but ‘nothing is 

done’. It seems clear that delays in closing crack houses arise 

because of legal impediments rather than because the authorities just 

do not know where the houses are. The difficulties in dealing with 

crack use generally, markets as well as crack houses, are complex; it 

is not clear that quicker or better intelligence from the general public 

(as distinct from those with inside information) would make much 

difference. 

17. However there is a strong belief in some quarters that drug abuse 

arises in part from alienation and social exclusion and can only be 

successfully rolled back by giving people a stronger sense that they 

participate in a community. One way to do this is to encourage 

initiatives⎯on leisure, traffic, housing, schools, etc⎯that are driven by 

people within local communities. Those who take this view see a need 



11 

for much more than better channels of communication between the 

public and the authorities, although they regard this as important also. 

18. There is a well-recognised need for better communications from the 

authorities to the public. The issues that are not well understood 

include: 

• that problems linked to drugs have intensified in some areas 

because of crack specifically, rather than because of an 

increase in drug abuse generally 

• why the authorities can rarely close crack houses immediately 

• why the need to collect evidence of dealing to secure 

convictions leads the police to use abrupt and apparently violent 

tactics against crack houses and crack dealers 

Some boroughs are working on these communications. Lambeth has 

placed signs about crack houses (much like the signs appealing for 

witnesses) in streets and on estates. It is reported that both 

Westminster and Lambeth have leafleted residents about the existence 

of crack houses and the action that they propose to take. There are 

other communications initiatives elsewhere in London. 

19. The degree to which fear of reprisal inhibits the public from 

communicating with the authorities about drugs is uncertain. On the 

one hand, many members of the public indignantly complain that they 

do call the police but the police do not respond. On the other hand, 

many people say that they fear reprisals, think the police may clumsily 

betray their sources, and do not want to put their family’s safety at risk. 

It is probably safe to assume that people who have information that 

many other people also have⎯for example, that there are comings and 

goings all hours at number 32⎯will contact the authorities. However, 

people who have more privileged information, by virtue of some family 

or friendship connection⎯about someone being a dealer, or having a 

gun⎯will be much more reluctant to volunteer information. 



12 

Crack markets 

20. Crack distribution is characterised by many low-level dealers operating 

at street level or out of crack houses. Street dealers are typically 

contacted by phone and rendezvous with users in the street. Deals are 

small, and are sometimes carried in the mouth. Dealers are said to 

hide small stashes in doorways, shrubbery and abandoned cars. A 

gradually reducing price is probably contributing to the growth in crack 

use; it is said that £5 will buy a small rock in some parts of London. 

21. Low level dealers congregate where there are known drug markets. 

Some of these markets are ‘open’ in the sense that a person would be 

able to locate a crack dealer by wandering around, without needing a 

phone number or an introduction. Open markets attract users and 

dealers from other areas, make crack more accessible to new users 

and increase crack-related problems in the area. There appears to 

have been some success in closing markets (Stonebridge, Kensall 

Rise, Kings Cross) but other markets defy sustained efforts to close 

them. Some markets, for example Soho, seem to be able to 

accommodate any number of dealers and there have not been violent 

clashes between competing dealers. Elsewhere, notably in Lambeth 

and Brent, there have been gun deaths attributed to turf wars between 

dealers. 

22. The great majority of street dealers are said to be black but we have 

not seen any firm data confirming this. It often appears to be assumed 

that most dealers are Jamaican, or from elsewhere in the Caribbean, 

and that they are selling crack produced from cocaine brought over 

from the Caribbean in small quantities by couriers. To the extent that 

this is happening, the links between those bringing in the cocaine and 

those selling the crack on the street are straightforward. However it is 

believed that most UK cocaine arrives in bulk in containers. The links 

between these wholesale cocaine importers and street crack 

distributors are mysterious and deserve careful investigation. 



13 

Enforcement 

23. Enforcement of the law against drugs is believed by some to be 

improving. Closure of crack houses in some areas of London has 

produced impressive reductions in acquisitive crime. There has also 

been valuable learning on how to reduce the chances of new crack 

houses developing. The need for close co-operation between police, 

housing, social services and drug treatment services is much better 

appreciated than it was. New techniques for arresting street dealers 

are said to have increased the chances of gaining convictions. There 

has been a series of initiatives to ‘design out’ crime and drug-taking by 

improving lighting and security, removing places to hide, and making it 

more difficult for thieves or dealers to move between buildings on 

estates. 

24. ASBOs are regarded by some (notably in Camden) as an effective tool 

for dealing with drug dealers and crack houses. Relatively recent 

changes to these orders improved their geographical reach and there 

has been more co-operation between boroughs to avoid dealers simply 

migrating over borders. However, many people continue to think that 

more visible policing, and especially more police on foot and on 

bicycles, is the best way of deterring street use and disrupting markets. 

25. Many enforcement measures are seen to displace rather than solve the 

problem, and there is widespread agreement that crack cannot be 

effectively tackled by enforcement alone. There is a growing emphasis 

on the need for more investment in treatment and in support for exusers. 

As might be expected, feelings amongst the public are divided, 

with some people demanding more vigorous enforcement and harsher 

sentencing, others believing enforcement is futile without more 

accessible treatment and more effort to address the social conditions 

that are conducive to crack use. 

26. There is a belief among some professionals that better training is 

needed; about drugs generally among those who work with young 

people⎯teachers, youth workers, policemen, probation officers, etc⎯ 

and about the effects of crack among drug services providers. 



14 

27. Radical measures of different sorts are occasionally mooted. Amongst 

these are: the creation of some new body, different to the police, and 

responsible for both enforcement and treatment of drug users; injecting 

rooms where injectors are permitted to inject and can access help; 

heroin on prescription; decriminalisation of all drugs. 

Treatment 

28. Many crack users do not think in terms of treatment and do not present 

at drug services. There is a marked contrast with heroin here; heroin 

users expect to be given methadone as a substitute drug and obtaining 

their prescription is a major factor both initiating and sustaining contact 

with drug services. The nature of crack addiction is of course different 

in that crack users do not feel physically ill if they stop using (although 

they may experience strong cravings). Crack users do not therefore 

have as acute a sense of dependence and are less focussed on help to 

overcome dependence. Crack users who also use heroin often 

present at drug services to get methadone and do not look for help with 

crack. An initial problem for drug services is therefore initiating a 

dialogue with crack users about their crack use. Many arrive at drug 

services via the criminal justice system rather than on their own 

initiative. 

29. There is no substitute drug for crack users; keeping off the drug means 

something has to change within the user. Treatment to try and bring 

about this change is varied and evolving. There are low threshold 

services intended to initiate contact and develop trust in the hope that 

users will return for more structured programmes when they feel more 

committed to change. There is, in some regimes, limited use of antidepressant 

drugs. Many services offer essentially diversionary 

therapies designed to build confidence and self-worth. Some drugs 

workers are optimistic about the helpfulness of both structured 

counselling and Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. Shiatsu, acupuncture 

and reflexology are also quite often on offer. The effectiveness of 

these therapies will depend to their being embedded in a structured 

framework, and also, critically, on the quality of the relationships 

established between clients and service providers. 



15 

30. Everyone agrees that success in helping crack users stop using 

requires a holistic approach⎯paying a lot of attention to the individual 

as an individual, and also providing co-ordinated practical support, 

especially in housing, but also, ideally, in training and employment. 

Crack users are likely to relapse if they return to an environment that 

has strong associations with use, so many look to be rehoused in a 

different location, at least temporarily. It is often difficult to arrange, 

and to fund, the practical help that gives crack users the best chance of 

staying clean. 

31. It is not clear how successful treatment for crack users is. A strong 

commitment to change on the part of the user is a necessary condition 

of success. Beyond this, the outcome seems to depend as much on 

practical help and support as on what might be more narrowly thought 

of as treatment. A National Treatment Outcomes Research Study in 

2002 reported that ‘four to five years after entering treatment, over half 

those using crack at intake were no longer doing so.’ A follow-up study 

of a cohort of crack users attending residential, abstention-based 

treatment at City Roads Crisis Intervention showed that 65% of those 

who could be contacted 18 months after treatment had returned to 

regular crack use. Relapsing is clearly common and success in 

resisting triggers to use depends largely on what else is going on in the 

user’s life⎯relationships, living circumstances, employment, etc. 

Triggers to relapse are thought to be: negative emotional states, 

including boredom and depression; contact with people associated with 

earlier drug use; having money; seeing drug-using paraphernalia; 

particular places associated with drug use; alcohol. 

32. Some people think the fact that drug services will help people wanting 

to stop using crack deserves more publicity to raise awareness. Other 

needs identified include more low threshold services to develop 

contacts with crack users, and substantial investment in residential 

rehabilitation facilities. The scope for improvement in success rates is 

often located primarily in follow-up services⎯practical help for users. 

Many people think that prisons could make a greater contribution to 

getting people off crack (and other drugs) than they do, perhaps 

especially by improving co-ordination with social and drug services on 

release. 



16 

Views of residents 

33. Thinking about what life was like in their neighbourhoods, many 

respondents regretted changes to the ethnic mix and complained about 

being frightened by groups of young people. These points were often 

made earlier, and with at least as much emphasis, as anything to do 

with drugs. 

34. However drugs were very soon mentioned in all the fieldwork with 

residents, a large majority of whom, in all the four boroughs visited, 

made a clear connection between crime and drugs. Those who were 

aware of prostitution in their localities also attributed this to drugs. The 

degree to which crack use was specifically identified as a cause of 

crime varied enormously. Some respondents, notably in Lambeth but 

also in Westminster, referred repeatedly to crack. Other respondents 

thought in terms of ‘drugs’ generally and some seemed almost 

unaware of crack. 

35. Intimidating groups of youths were mentioned by some respondents in 

all boroughs but particularly by residents on the Lisson Green estate in 

Westminster. There seemed to be a widespread feeling among many 

respondents that children and young people are out of control. Many 

people feel that children do not respect authority and some blame this 

on the prohibition of corporal punishment. However many also say that 

young people are bored and disaffected because youth clubs and 

recreational facilities have been closed and they have ‘nothing to do’. 

36. Feelings about how the authorities were coping with drug problems 

varied. Many respondents felt a sense of outrage that flagrant defiance 

of the law in relation to drugs, as well as the associated criminal and 

anti-social behaviour, was allowed to persist without more vigorous and 

effective action by the authorities. Many residents had informed the 

police about drug users and dealers, and about crack houses. Most 

had been left feeling that nothing at all had been done and that the 

police were not interested in hearing from the public about these 

matters. Respondents in Camden were particularly scathing about the 

ineffectiveness of the police. Some respondents across the four 

boroughs, however, thought that policing had perhaps improved latterly 



17 

and that more effective action was being taken, especially against 

crack houses. In Lambeth particularly there seemed to be a sense of 

things getting better. 

37. Although there was a widespread feeling of frustration that more 

vigorous and speedy action was not taken against drug users, many 

residents also thought that the underlying causes of drug abuse⎯poor 

housing and lack of opportunity among them⎯needed to be 

addressed. The futility of continually moving users on from one house 

to another was noted and there was demand for more treatment 

facilities. A few respondents advocated legalisation, or free 

prescription, of all drugs on the grounds that this would, they thought, 

take distribution out of the hands of criminals and drastically reduce all 

drug related crime. 

38. It became clear that most residents did not understand the various 

legal procedures that had to be complied with for a crack house to be 

closed. Residents in Lambeth spoke of periods of years between their 

getting in touch with the authorities about a crack house and it being 

closed. Even delays of weeks seemed unreasonable to many people 

given the scale of the nuisance caused. Lambeth has erected street 

signs about crack houses and these seem to have been a factor 

reassuring residents that the authorities are getting on top of the 

problem. The leaflets said to have been distributed by Westminster 

explaining the crack house protocol were not mentioned by any 

respondents. 



18 

D. CONCLUSIONS 

This study is devoted largely to describing an issue and its 

ramifications. It does not lend itself readily to neat conclusions. 

However a number of points perhaps deserve to be highlighted. 

1. Regarding communications, the public often regards crack/drug 

problems as urgent and the authorities’ response usually appears to 

lack urgency. In these circumstances it is important for local authorities 

and the police to communicate with residents and reassure them that 

problems have been noted and are receiving urgent attention. 

Lambeth’s use of street signs seems to be appreciated. The public’s 

interest in the detail of legal impediments and the legal system is 

limited but two main points deserve to be better understood... 

• why it can be difficult to close a crack house quickly 

• precipitate action is not necessarily the most effective longer 

term; there is a need for evidence if dealers are to be taken off 

the streets and collecting evidence takes time 

2. Many members of the public have not identified crack as a drug that is 

especially liable to cause crime and nuisance. Their attitudes towards 

‘drug problems’ might be less critical of authority if they had a better 

understanding of crack. It is however difficult to see how 

communications could improve their understanding without also 

seeming to talk up the problem, with a risk that people will be made 

more frightened. 

3. Fear of reprisal clearly discourages many members of the public from 

contacting the authorities about drugs. We imagine that the more 

useful to the police their information would be, the more frightened of 

reprisal they are. Some of the respondents in this research seemed 

not to think first of anonymous phone lines; there is perhaps a case for 

giving these more publicity. The public need reassurance that the 

police, and the criminal justice system, take great care to protect the 

anonymity of sources but it is not clear how this should best be 

delivered. 



19 

4. It is very difficult to assess whether significant numbers of recreational 

cocaine users will be tempted to try crack. On the one hand it is 

worrying that crack and cocaine are the same drug in a different form, 

and that their effects differ mainly because they are taken differently. 

We do not know if cocaine users know how easy it is to transform 

cocaine into crack, or if there are significant numbers of recreational 

crack users mixing socially with cocaine users. It seems likely that 

crack has a very negative image amongst cocaine users, but we do not 

know how robust this image is or what underpins it. At present a 

communications campaign to warn cocaine users off crack would 

appear ill advised, but the above points need to be looked at. 

5. In relation to crack more generally... 

• there is a clear need for efficient information sharing about 

crack... 

- enforcement; what works? should more use be made of 

ASBOs? what guidelines are effective in preventing the 

emergence of crack houses? 

- treatment; again, what is working? 

• professionals recommend more investment in low threshold 

programmes for crack users and also in residential rehabilitation 

• more resources almost certainly need to be directed towards 

those with a dual diagnosis of mental health problems and drug 

dependency 

• prison represents a bigger opportunity for crack users to step 

away from the drug than is fully exploited; there is a particular 

need for better follow-up and co-ordination with other services 

• it is exceptionally difficult for sex workers to break free from 

crack dependence and they need carefully targeted help 



20 

E. FINDINGS IN DETAIL 

1. Crack: the apparent scale of the problem 

Crack is derived (by a simple process, see quotes pages 39, 63) from 

cocaine. Estimates of the UK cocaine/crack consumption annually are 

between 22 and 40 tonnes. 1 

Crack use in the UK is pocketed and the problems it causes are 

unevenly distributed throughout the country. London is particularly 

badly affected. London accounted for 23% of all drug offences in the 

UK, but for 55% of all crack offences. 2 All four of the boroughs visited 

for this project are designated High Crack Areas (HCAs) 3 

We have not looked closely at the distribution of the problem elsewhere 

in the country, but it appears, as might be expected, that the major 

conurbations in England are affected, perhaps particularly Bristol, 

Liverpool, Manchester and Newcastle. “Use is concentrated most in 

areas of deprivation in the largest urban areas, especially in London 

and the South... However... most areas have seen a growth of crack 

problems.” 4 Crack is also emerging as a problem in smaller towns and 

cities, more in the south than the north; Hastings, Reading and Oxford 

are examples. Serious crack problems are thought to be emerging in 

some rural areas, notably Somerset. In Scotland the picture is unclear 

but it appears that Aberdeen is the worst affected Scottish city, though 

the reasons for this are disputed. According to the Scottish Executive 

“use of cocaine and crack cocaine has increased recently and is 

expected to continue to increase.” We have not seen data on the 

situation in Wales. 

1 GLADA (Greater London Alcohol and Drug Alliance): London: The highs and lows. A report 

from the Greater London Alcohol and Drug Alliance incorporating the findings from the 

London Drug Indicators Project. Feb 2003 

2 GLADA 

3 “A DAT selected as an HCA must be 3 of the following: in an BCA area which is in the top 

35 for acquisitive crime, in a police force area which is in the top 10 for gun crime, in a Petty 

Sessional Area in the top 35 for soliciting, a DAT in the top 35 for crack related offences, or in 

a Health Authority Regional Office Area in the top 35 for crack users presenting for 

treatment.”s 

4 NTA press release 20 Mar 03 



21 

Although crack gives rise to serious social problems (as subsequent 

pages describe) the numbers of users are relatively low. “The British 

Crime Survey 2001/2002 best estimates suggest that: 

58,000 people used crack within the previous 12 months 

622,000 people used cocaine within the previous 12 months 

“Crack is still much less widely used than cocaine or heroin, especially 

by young people aged 16-25, according to the British Crime Survey.” 5 

Estimates of numbers of crack users are generally regarded as 

unreliable. No-one is at all confident they know how many 

‘recreational’ users⎯people who use on an occasional basis⎯there 

are. Numbers of problematic crack users are assumed to exceed 

greatly the numbers of users presenting for treatment. 

“It’s a lot worse than it looks (from the arrest and treatment 

data).” 

DAT, Brent 

One reason for this is that many crack users (particularly in London) 

also use heroin, and present for treatment as heroin users rather than 

crack users. According to the National Drug Treatment Monitoring 

System, of all people receiving treatment for drugs in London, 11.6% 

were receiving it for crack and 57.2% for heroin. Of the four boroughs 

visited, Lambeth had the highest percentage of people receiving 

treatment for crack, at 15.5% (heroin 69.4%). 6 

Crack is very often said to be the secondary drug, with users who 

present for treatment citing heroin as their primary drug. For example, 

in the Soho-based Hungerford Drug Project in 2001 – 2002, 14% of 

people accessing services (other than simply the needle exchange) 

said crack was their main drug and 28% that it was their secondary 

drug. These figures compare with heroin: 40% main drug, 11% 

secondary drug. The degree to which polydrug use makes it difficult to 

arrive at firm figures for crack users in treatment is apparent from the 

clientele at City Roads: in 2001, “polydrug use was common, with 92% 

of admissions using heroin as a primary or secondary drug and 72% 


6 cited in GLADA, pp22,23 



22 

using crack/cocaine. 23% were using methadone as an additional 

drug.” 7 

Arrest referral statistics provide another perspective on the scale of 

crack as a problem. Nationally, “22% of those screened by arrest 

referral workers reported use of crack, compared with only 6% use of 

cocaine” 8 . In Hackney (where there is a pilot mandatory drug urine test 

for arrestees), “between September 2001 and November 2002, 31% of 

arrestees for theft tested positive for cocaine only, less than 7% for 

opiates only and 36% for both cocaine and opiates. In all, 74% of 

people arrested in Hackney for theft tested positive for cocaine and/or 

heroin. This compares with 70% of those arrested for burglary and 

51% of robbery arrestees... Based on figures from drug testing in 

Hackney the MPS has reported that 48% of people arrested for street 

crime (robbery, snatch thefts and car jacking) in London have a 

significant cocaine dependency.” 9 In 2001, a total of 6,619 

assessments of arrestees for drug problems were made in London, of 

which 3,476 (52.5%) mention crack, 3,693 (56.7%) heroin. 

As these figures suggest, crack users are believed to make a 

disproportionately large contribution to the figures on acquisitive crime. 

“They spend more money every month on their drug than heroin users 

- £478 compared with £248.” 10 “The total spent on illegal drugs by 

those seen (following arrest referral) was around £550 million in 

England, approximately £11,000 per individual, although not all of this 

will be attributable to crime.” 11 “Arrestees who used both heroin and 

crack/cocaine in the last 12 months reported the highest levels of 

expenditure – an average of £290 a week. Drug-using arrestees 

reported higher levels of illegal income than non-drug-using arrestees. 

Users of both heroin and cocaine/crack cocaine reported the highest 

levels of illegal income, with an average of £15,000 in the previous 

year.” 12 

7 City Roads: Building a Better Future, Annual Review year ended 31 March 2001 

8 Sondhi 2002 

9 Quoted in GLADA 

10 Sondhi 2002 

11 GLADA 

12 GLADA 



23 

Almost everyone in a position to have an informed opinion regards 

crack as a very serious and probably growing problem. We have not 

spoken to anyone who believes that it is likely to be possible to reduce 

supply to any significant extent. 

“Certainly there is a growing threat from crack cocaine 

throughout the capital.” 


“There has been a massive increase in drug related 

antisocial behaviour in Camden over the last two or three 

years... and this is partly due to the rise in crack use.” 

DAT, Camden 

“Crack has really hit big... It’s worrying because I think crack 

is fashionable. It’s coming from different suppliers with much 

more aggression.” 


Increased use is believed to reflect wider availability and reducing 

prices (see also section 7). 

“When I was at college 25 years ago you could buy weed or 

hash for £10 or £15, and heroin and that were really 

expensive. But now it’s the same price; it's ten quid a hit. It's 

very cheap and that's why people are doing that and not 

booze. It's a nightmare.” 


“It’s accessible, it’s incredibly easy to get hold of, it’s very 

cheap. I gather that the average price for a rock of crack in 

London now is between £10 and £15, and the price for a rock 

in Brixton at the moment is between £5 and £10.” 

Crime Forum, Lambeth 

Although there are some who are optimistic about treatment (see also 

section 9), most people working in the field believe that the situation 

with crack will get worse before it gets better. 

“(In two years time) we’ll be more worried about it. We’ll see 

increasing use, increasing chaotic use. I think we’ll also be 

on top of it in terms of the treatment side. I think the 

increasing provision of treatment will go a long way to 

helping crack users... You’re talking of some time before 

possibly seeing a reduction in the problem and in the 

associated crime as well. Into years, I think.” 


In some areas, including the four boroughs on which this research 

focuses, some people believe that anti-crack measures of one kind or 

another are beginning to work. For example: 



24 

“It reached crisis in Brixton in 2001, 2002. That was the point 

at which it really became absolutely obvious and there was a 

sense that the streets had been lost and that the whole thing 

was massively out of control. I think in Lambeth the whole 

thing is just starting to turn the corner actually.” 


But real, infectious optimism is rare. 

“I don’t think it’s necessarily going to get worse. I think that 

we’re just going to become more aware of what’s going on. 

It’s already very, very bad.” 


2. Who uses crack and why? 

2.1 In general 

A Home Office document this year⎯Tackling crack – A National 

Plan⎯identifies crack users as follows. “The vast majority of crack 

users in the UK are white. Many of these are poly drug users or 

dependent users of heroin as well as crack. Hence the majority of 

crime associated with crack, including supply, is carried out by white 

crack users... However... African-Caribbean communities have been 

shown to use crack at the same level or slightly above that of white and 

Asian communities... It is not clear from available data what percentage 

of primary crack users are black compared with white users. However, 

many of those who report crack use in the white community do so as 

part of combined habits, such as of heroin, whereas African-Caribbean 

users are much less likely to use heroin, on its own or alongside 

crack.” 13 

In relation to ethnicity, most people with knowledge of the crack 

problem appear to agree with this analysis. In brief⎯most crack users 

are white, but most white crack users also use heroin, (their heroin use 

often preceding their crack use), many inject both crack and heroin (at 

least in London) and a majority regards heroin as their primary drug 

(see also section 2.2, below). Black and other ethnic minority crack 

users are more likely to smoke than inject it. ”Nearly 50% of those 

reporting crack use (and no heroin use) were black, compared to only 

16% of those using heroin and crack and 11% of those using heroin 

13 Abigail, N. Tackling Crack: A National Plan. Requirements for DATs. Jan 2003 



25 

only. However, the National Drug Treatment Monitoring System 

(NDTMS) reveals that only 20% of crack users presenting to treatment 

were from black and minority ethnic groups.” 14 

“Our crack (only) users are predominantly black.” 


Some of those working in the field believe that when crack first 

appeared, usually said to have been in the 80s, it was used primarily 

by black people and was smoked. However others believe that crack 

users in the UK have been primarily white for at least a decade. 

“In the early 90s... crack, although it had this profile as a 

black street drug, the vast majority of users in the early days 

were certainly white. That has changed now and it has 

become a far more universally available drug. There is a lot 

of focus on black communities and crack, but in terms of 

consumption the majority population is a broad mix of local 

people.” 


Clearly the division between white and BME users is not absolute; 

there are primary crack users who are white and who smoke rather 

than inject, just as there are some black users who also use heroin and 

inject. 

A slightly different way of segmenting the crack-using population is by 

drug history and route in. 

“You can talk about two different populations. One is a kind 

of standing polydrug using population⎯people who started 

drug use quite early in their lives, sort of eleven to teens, and 

have taken a lot of a big variety of drugs. A lot of them have 

got existing heroin habits or perhaps alcohol dependencies, 

or both, and they’re certainly going to smoke weed and take 

tranquillisers. A lot of that population may be in treatment 

but they certainly use quite a lot of crack. So there’s that 

population who will take whatever is out there, and as much 

of it as they can afford. There’s also other routes in. People 

may have a history of smoking cannabis, or not really 

necessarily problematic drug use, or maybe drinking too 

much. But they have come into crack through a different 

route, and a lot of the time for all the reasons why people 

take drugs⎯family break up, lost their job, or just for curiosity 

and experimentation. The first population tends to be more 

injectors and the second population tends to be more 

smokers. The second population has moved from casual 

drug use into problematic crack use. But these distinctions 

14 GLADA 



26 

are all blurred.” 


We have not seen any age breakdowns of crack users. It seems to be 

assumed that younger and younger people are taking to crack but we 

do not know if there is any clear evidence of this. Very young girls, as 

young as 12 and 13, are said to be sex workers and it seems to be 

assumed that they are working to support a crack habit. However, 

many white polydrug users have been taking drugs for years; it is not 

uncommon for them to be in their late thirties or older. 

“We’ve started to find quite a few 40+ people who are just 

starting getting into crack.” 


Black users very rarely have a long history of heroin use but we do not 

know if this means that their average age is younger than that of white 

users. 

There is widespread agreement that crack use correlates with all kinds 

of social deprivation. “A neighbourhood with a crack market is a 

neighbourhood with other social problems.” 15 “Research demonstrates 

that problematic, dependent drug and alcohol use is usually a symptom 

of more complex and entrenched social problems, a form of selfmedication 

for the ills experienced by those who are socially excluded: 

truants and pupils excluded from school, the homeless, people who 

have spent time in the care or protection of social services. It is 

important to recognise that the demand side of the drugs market will 

not be undermined until a significant impact is made on these issues.” 16 

“His (a crack user) mother’s a heroin addict on the streets... 

He ain’t got a cat in hell’s chance. Behind most of the people 

(taking crack) you’ll usually find dysfunctional somewhere 

down the line.” 


“There are people who use drugs because they’ve got a 

certain amount of pain in their lives. Only about five percent 

of people I’ve seen are people who otherwise had everything 

going for them. Sixty-five percent of our clients are people 

who’ve been in the care system. I don’t want to make the 

care system seem all bad, as I’ve worked in it, but that 

statistic doesn’t do it any favours.” 


15 Burgess, Robin: Disrupting Crack Markets. A Practice Guide, Drug Strategy Directorate, 

Home Office 

16 Camden DAT: Camden drug and alcohol strategy 2002-5 



27 

Deprivation and personal trauma contribute to crack use amongst 

whites much as they contribute to heroin use⎯most white crack users 

come to crack via heroin. They are also regarded as important to black 

use, but are at least as often mentioned in relation to dealing as using. 

“Walk around Stonebridge and Church End. These are 

areas where 50 or 55% of people living there are under the 

age of 25. Many of whom have children. There are very 

disproportionate levels of unemployment or low skilled 

temporary work in those communities. Crack use and crack 

dealing, low level dealing, is a way of escaping from that.” 

DAT, Brent 

Lack of legitimate employment opportunities is often mentioned as a 

reason why young men are attracted to dealing in drugs. Dealers in 

some areas are sometimes said to be predominantly black (see also 

section 7). 

“All they (black kids on the estate) see is the bad role 

models... What they tend to see is the flashy young black guy 

with loads of jewellery, flashy car, and they think⎯’why 

bother to go to school?’... Also there is peer pressure (to get 

money)⎯the boots, the hi-fis, the mobiles.” 

Community Housing Officer, Westminster 

“Who wants to stack shelves at Tesco’s when they could be 

dealing even cannabis and making ten times the money and 

have status among their friends and have the right clothes?” 


“If I was a disenchanted 16 year old on a council estate with 

no chance of work, I’d want some of that. It’s easy money. 

You see Joe Bloggs riding around in a BMW because of it. 


It is occasionally argued that crack is ‘instantly’ addictive. 

“That is the major thing, with crack cocaine, the 

addictiveness of it. It’s an immediate addiction. People don’t 

realise how immediate it is. You can be hooked on the first 

hit.” 


But many experienced drug workers refer to ‘recreational users’. That 

there should be any occasional, controlled use is difficult to reconcile 

with crack addiction setting in very quickly. Some knowledgeable 

people certainly believe that there are occasional users of crack able to 

control their use. However it is widely agreed that occasional use is 

very liable to develop into problematic use if life circumstances change. 



28 

“There certainly are people who recreationally use crack, for 

whom it’s not a massive problem... I think there is a massive 

population out there that occasionally use and I think that 

population is growing as well.” 


“There was an idea that if you use crack occasionally it 

always goes into heavy dependent use. If you have comorbid 

factors, like loss of a job or relationship difficulties, 

what you will get is that it will maybe lead to an increase of 

drug use, whether that is cannabis or crack or heroin. In 

terms of crack, if they have been using recreationally for a 

while, if you have a co-factor, it will often increase the 

amount of use.” 


“People have been managing their crack habit, and then 

something happens⎯their partner leaves, or 

whatever⎯which plunges them into chaotic use.” 

MANAGING A CRACK HABIT? 

“I’m thinking, sort of, use at the weekends or once or twice a 

week... That happens. People do report⎯’well, it was OK for 

a while’. People arrive having got themselves into a difficult 

situation and think it’s resolved and that they can go back to 

that sort of light use, But it doesn’t work and they come 

back. We do have a bit of a revolving door.” 


A distinctive feature of crack is often said to be how rapidly problematic 

use can develop. The descent into serious dependence and a chaotic 

lifestyle is reported, typically, to be much more rapid than is usually the 

case with heroin. 

“Primary crack users can be people who have got a job, left 

school and got a job, and then suddenly taken a very steep 

nose dive down into very compulsive drug use.” 

DAT, Camden 

“The thing about crack which... they’ve never said about 

heroin, is that you can be a 35 year old family man, doing 

really well, running your own business, everything going fine, 

and next thing you know... It does seem to be a very quick 

move. You don’t get that profile among heroin users. I’m 

sure there are links with deprivation but there are also very 

clear cases where there is no link at all and it is more about 

the grip that the drug has. What I don’t understand is why 

people feel the need to take that risk in the first place, given 

that most people say⎯’God! you don’t want to do that!’” 

DAT, Lambeth 

The appeal of drugs is sometimes described in terms of the ‘push’ of 

personal and social circumstances, combined with the ‘pull’ of the 

drug’s effects. Class A drug use, as noted, correlates closely with 

deprivation and personal trauma. The strength of the ‘pull’ of a drug’s 

effects, relative to the strength of the ‘push’ of circumstances, can 



29 

never be known but only guessed at. For this reason, there is only 

limited value in trying to assign weights to push and pull. However, in 

the case of crack, some drugs workers suspect that the ‘pull’ is a more 

important factor in the equation than is the case with other drugs, 

including heroin. Another way of putting this, perhaps, is to say that 

exposure to crack, and trial of it, is more likely to lead (rapidly) to 

problems than is the case with heroin and other drugs. 

“There’s something very specific about the compulsivity of 

crack use... I have never sort of gone down the road that 

says that this drug leads to this behaviour... You used to 

have, you know, violent heroin users and very laid back 

heroin users... It’s all situational. Until crack happened... 

Crack sets alarm bells ringing... It does tend to kick off 

certain patterns of behaviour that are quite consistent across 

lots of different groups.” 

DAT, Camden 

Crack delivers a very rapid and vivid high (referred to by the NTA as ‘a 

state of excited delirium’ 17 ) that leaves the user immediately wanting to 

repeat or prolong the experience. Many users are thought to be 

incapable of resisting the appeal of the high. One drugs worker 

consulted for this study argued that the resulting compulsiveness of 

crack was a more important part of the picture than many believed. He 

argued that crack users exaggerated the degree to which their use 

reflected deprivation or personal problems. 

“The drug is such a psychological drug, a mind thing... It 

subconsciously takes over and causes a person to blow 

problems out of proportion as an excuse to use... So there 

might be mitigating circumstances, social problems, family 

problems, but at the end of the road, they will blow them out 

of proportion to use. Their want for the drug is so great, and 

the control that the drug has over them is so great.” 


The intensity of crack use⎯amounts taken, length of binges, etc⎯is 

often said to be dictated by opportunity. Crack users continue to use, 

typically, until the supply is exhausted or the money runs out and there 

is no possibility of raising more money. Although this seems to be the 

dominant pattern, clearly crack users vary enormously in how much of 

the drug they take and how much they spend on it. 

17 NTA press release, 24 June 2002 



30 

2.2 Poly-drug use 

“In many ways crack users are less predictable than a lot of 

other drugs in terms of their patterns of use, how frequently 

they will use, how much they’ll use. A using episode can 

range from £10 to £200 to £500. It can either be daily or 

once a fortnight or once a month.” 


Many long-term heroin users have started to use crack, and some 

crack users use heroin. The former almost all inject both drugs, often 

simultaneously⎯a practice referred to as ’snowballing’ (sometimes 

‘speedballing’ but strictly this is heroin and amphetamine together). 

Some of the latter smoke both drugs, but many inject. This pattern of 

injecting crack and using other drugs simultaneously seems to be 

particularly prevalent in London, especially, as already noted, among 

white heroin users. 

“Round here it’s very different from anywhere else really 

because it’s Central London. For example, a large number 

of our crack users inject crack because it’s more cost 

effective and easier, and when you’ve got such a low opinion 

of yourself you don’t care. Though people in other places 

don’t even know you can do that.” 


“Very few people in this area smoke crack any more. It is 

nearly all injected.” 


The fact that many heroin users have adopted crack is a major reason 

why crack use has increased so rapidly in London. 

“What we’re seeing in London, which is different from the rest 

of the country, is that nearly all our injecting heroin users are 

now using crack cocaine. The massive... increase in crack 

cocaine use in London is actually among injecting heroin 

users rather than there being a new community of crack and 

crack only users.” 

London-based drugs policy advisor 

Long-term heroin users are believed to be attracted to crack in part 

because it has perceptible and pleasant effects⎯it gets them 

high⎯whereas heroin has become a sort of medicine they have to take 

in order not to feel ill. It is also true that many heroin users have, 

throughout their lives, been receptive to taking whatever drugs have 

been around; they started to take crack because it became available 

and most found that they liked it. 



31 

Some heroin users appear to have been attracted to crack as a means 

of reducing the amount of heroin they take. Heroin retains its 

reputation as the drug that it is most difficult to come off, whereas crack 

is regarded as significantly less addictive because you do not get 

physically sick if you stop taking it. Some heroin users appear to 

believe that anything that reduces their heroin use is a good thing. 

“When you talk to people who are heroin and crack users, 

they are, some of them, quite clearly saying that the 

advantage of crack over heroin is there are no difficult 

withdrawal symptoms. So what they’re actually doing is 

upping their crack use in order to help them reduce their 

heroin use, because then, if you can’t get any crack 

tomorrow you at least don’t wake up feeling sick.” 

DAT, Camden 

As noted, crack users quite frequently start taking heroin. Crack leaves 

the user feeling brittle, restless, depressed and unable to sleep; heroin 

helps manage this comedown. There are crack users who will not use 

unless they have heroin available as a ‘parachute’ to mitigate the 

comedown. 

It is argued by some that heroin users are also tempted to use crack as 

an alternative because it is cheaper. 

“Most crack heads have gone on to crack because it’s 

cheaper than heroin... Oh God! It’s so cheap!” 


Many drug services have found that polydrug users, regardless of how 

much they are spending on each drug, are more likely to present for 

heroin dependency and to regard their crack use as secondary. 

“We’ve got an awful lot of people using heroin to take the bite 

out of the (crack) comedown... We do see crack users 

who’ve found out that using heroin can take the pressure off. 

But there are also a lot of people around who’ve been using 

heroin for a long time and are now using a lot more crack 

and they don’t realise it... We always ask people what their 

main drug of choice is and they say heroin, but if you look at 

the longer interviews, for many of them, it’s crack.” 


Alcohol is also useful in managing crack comedown and many crack 

users develop alcohol dependency, often unknowingly, as a result. 

Valium is occasionally mentioned in the same role. 



32 

3. Why is crack singled out as a serious problem? 

Some people with long experience of working with drug users think that 

it is a mistake to single out crack from other drug use, not least 

because so many crack users also use heroin. 

“There are very few people who just take heroin or heroin 

substitutes, or crack. They take them both... I don’t think it’s 

right or fair to look at crack in isolation. If you do, then you 

are behind the times.” 


But it is generally agreed that crack poses particular problems that 

make it a distinctive threat. Recognition of this distinctiveness is 

evident in the Home Office having devised and issued an action 

plan⎯Tackling Crack: A National Plan. Thirty-seven DAT areas have 

been designated High Crack Areas (HCAs). DATs in HCAs have been 

required to produce action plans on crack and regular ‘Crack Returns’ 

detailing the measures they are taking, and with what success, against 

this particular drug. 

Crack is regarded as a particularly dangerous drug for a number of 

interlocking reasons. As already noted, it exerts a very strong pull⎯the 

effects, especially on first use, are dramatic and highly enjoyable, 

leaving most users wanting to repeat the experience immediately. As 

would be expected, the soaring high from a first hit of crack is followed 

by a profound low; fear of this is one of number of factors that 

encourage bingeing. 

“It is on the steep comedown path from crack that panic sets 

in. You end up lower than you were before the high. That’s 

where the aggression comes. You’re scrabbling about on 

the floor trying to find anything on the ground that will do.” 


The effects are short lived, in contrast with heroin, and users are 

therefore in an on-going state of wanting more. More has to be paid 

for, and crack users are in an equally persistent state of needing to 

raise money, often by crime or prostitution. A bingeing, out-of-control 

crack user is capable of spending very large sums in one 

day⎯considerably more than would be spent by a heroin addict. 



33 

“It’s about economics. You can manage a heroin habit. It’s 

£40 a day. But with crack you can spend up to £300 a day 

just trying to keep the buzz going. So then you are much 

more likely to be driven to engage in crime.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

“There’s a kind of maximum spend around heroin which is 

probably less that £100 a day. But with crack you can spend 

up to around £1000 a day. A typical spend is less than that. 

There is research that says a typical spend is around £800 a 

week but that is still more than £100 a day.” 


Crack is a stimulant and users are typically very active and determined 

in raising money to buy more. Crack is also an anaesthetic and raises 

the pain threshold. The psychological effects of crack on a user are no 

doubt complex but amongst them seems often to be the perception that 

the only thing that matters is how much they want more crack. Crack 

use therefore generates strong demand, often over periods of days 

rather than hours, in people who are unusually uninhibited, even for 

problematic drug users, in what they are prepared to do to get what 

they want. Accordingly people on crack are liable to be daring and 

aggressive in the crimes they are prepared to commit to regain the high 

(see also the discussion of crack houses, section 5.3, below). 

“Heroin doesn’t seem to be as violent. Crack seems to be 

violent, lots of violence. I don’t have enough information as 

to whether or not the drug affects them differently but 

probably it does... I don’t know many Crack heads that are 

not violent in some sort of way.” 


We should note that crack users, whilst often aggressive when they are 

bingeing and trying to generate funds for more crack, are not especially 

likely to be aggressive in other situations. As more than one 

respondent in this project pointed out, there is a danger that users will 

be demonised by the focus on crack and the publicity surrounding the 

problems it causes. 

“There’s a danger that crack use or crack users gets 

demonised too much. I think that’s a problem in tackling it. 

Yes, it’s associated with violent crime, but that needs to be 

seen as a separate issue. There’s an increase in gun crime 

per se. And I think there’s a real danger that, amongst 

treatment centres as well, people are now being seen as 

incredibly violent and aggressive and difficult to treat. That 

hasn’t been our experience here. So I think there needs to 

be some work done around helping people to see the reality, 

sometimes, particularly amongst treatment services.” 




34 

A majority of professionals involved with the crack problem believe that 

a crack habit leads people into crime; people who use crack mug and 

steal or prostitute themselves in order to pay for more crack. The drug 

dependency drives the crime. 

“You will have the dependence first because that generates 

the demand for the money to support the habit. I have no 

knowledge where someone has entered into a criminal 

activity, theft or burglary and thought⎯‘Hey, I can use the 

proceeds to get a bit high’.” 


Whilst this is obviously true on one level, some observers believe that a 

proportion of people who use crack were committing crimes before 

they started using. Having a crack habit channelled criminal activity 

that would, it is assumed, have had a different manifestation had it not 

been for crack. 

“An awful lot of problems with drug users, their offending 

behaviour predates their drug use. So they’re not offending 

to support a habit. They’re into offending and then they get 

into drug use.” 

DAT, Camden 

“One view is that these people are criminals and they would 

carry out the criminality, whether it’s street robberies or 

whatever, regardless of whether they had a drug habit or not. 

The rationale is, you treat the drug habit then you’ll reduce 

the criminality. Treatment is seen as an effective crime 

reduction tool. But not everyone accepts that.” 


The aggression of some crack users, in their efforts to raise money, is 

complemented by the culture of violence that often develops around 

crack dealing. 

“There’s a lot of violence and aggression around crack, 

because of the way it’s sold and the culture around it. The 

heroin user is desperately sad; the crack user is desperately 

violent.” 


Selling crack is enormously profitable and it is not difficult technically to 

transform cocaine into crack and become a street crack dealer (see 

also section 7). It is a very attractive market to the seller because 

buyers return for more, quickly and repeatedly. Market conditions 

generate fierce competition and this in turn seems to have played a 



35 

part in encouraging dealers to use guns, although some argue that this 

was a general criminal trend anyway, irrespective of crack markets. 

“Crack is different because there’s violence associated with 

it. There isn’t always local concern about heroin use 

because it’s not having a damaging social consequence... 

You don’t just get the crack or the cocaine dealing, you have 

the gun crime that goes with it because it is far more lucrative 

than heroin dealing... Crack cocaine is so lucrative that you 

get criminals who specialise in robbing crack cocaine 

dealers, which is why you now have the crack cocaine 

dealers protecting themselves.” 


“I’m always unhappy about simplifying the relationship 

between a drug and increasing levels of gun violence... 

There’s a whole range of reasons which, you know, cause 

gun violence. But certainly there appears to be increased 

competition between dealers and tied up with sense of 

territorialism which are tied up with senses of machismo, 

which means there is an escalation of violence and violent 

behaviour.” 


Use of guns, and gun deaths, of course contribute enormously to public 

fear of crime. This fear becomes a factor in itself making crime more 

easily possible, and can contribute to the development of a vicious 

circle. 

“It is not just the violence, it is the fear of it... If you have got 

an area where people are frightened to go out at night, then 

that gives everyone more opportunity to go out and commit 

crime. There aren’t people on the streets keeping an eye 

out.” 


Regular bingeing on crack of course has very negative effects on users 

themselves. Their physical health is liable to deteriorate rapidly, in part 

because normal patterns of eating and sleeping are disrupted. Heavy 

crack users are said to be readily recognisable and this is part of the 

problem with crack⎯members of the public notice crack users and feel 

threatened by them. 

“It’s a very compulsive drug, and very disinhibiting. It can 

make people quite violent and aggressive... Your old heroin 

junkies that sit by chain smoking, nod off, look a bit scruffy 

but generally otherwise, not being too much of a pain in the 

arse. Whereas your crack user is much more sort of in your 

face, tends to have like bloodshot eyes, big red scabs all 

over their face, running around nicking bags off people, 

desperate for their next rock. And people notice it, and 

people feel very angry about the level of obvious drug use on 



36 

their streets.” 

DAT, Camden 

“You see a crack head or a junkie … You can’t escape the 

fact that they’re usually out of it. They look out of it, and 

they’re filthy dirty and stink to high heaven... If there’s a 

derelict car, they go and sleep in a derelict car and use that 

to jack up in.” 


As noted, many crack users inject. Because the drug is so compulsive, 

because they do not want to be caught in possession, and possibly for 

other reasons arising from the mentality crack produces, they often 

inject very soon after getting hold of their crack, wherever they are and 

with little regard for whether or not they may be observed. 

“They cause a public nuisance because they want to take 

their crack right away... The last thing you want to do is hold 

your drugs for any length of time. The longer you hold your 

drugs the more chance you've got of a policeman stopping 

you and arresting you for being in possession.” 


Many also seem to move rapidly to injecting in the large veins of the 

groin. This is risky in itself, in part because crack is an anaesthetic and 

the user is therefore less likely to notice if he/she misses the vein. 

Injecting in the groin also involves exposure, is liable to be 

conspicuous, and causes offence. Seeing crack users inject 

themselves in the groin in doorways and parks creates an impression 

amongst the public that drug use is out of control and something needs 

to be done. 

“Because crack and cocaine are anaesthetic, it’s very easy to 

miss the vein.” 


“One of the things that people complain about most is public 

injecting... Crack users tend to move into injecting into their 

groin very quickly... Partly it’s a cultural thing, but partly its 

part of the compulsiveness of it... Injecting into your groin 

involves dropping your trousers... and it’s very offensive to 

people who live round here... That’s a major issue for us.” 

DAT, Camden 

Public facilities in High Crack Areas have to adjust to the aggression 

and lack of inhibition of users. 



37 

“I went to see my GP the other day and two crack heads got 

in to the disabled toilet, jacking up. They’ve now got CCTV... 

The receptionist had to go and get ‘em out but I helped ‘em. 

They shouldn’t be doing that... You’ve got security in 

hospitals, but UCH, particularly at times during the night, 

won’t take emergencies because their staffs keep getting 

beat up because of the crack heads and alcoholics.” 


There is evidence that sustained crack use leads to mental illness. 

Bingeing crack users often suffer from acute paranoia and anxiety. 

However, it appears not to be clear whether crack-induced mental 

problems are temporary or permanent. Equally, it seems not to be 

clear what proportion of users suffer from mental illness that predates 

any crack use. Many people involved in treatment for drug addiction 

refer to a significant proportion of patients with ‘dual diagnosis’⎯mental 

illness as well as addiction. 

“A lot of these people are attracting mental health diagnoses. 

Whether that’s appropriate or not we’ll find out in time... They 

are being treated in mental health services and they may or 

may not have underlying serious mental health problems. 

Certainly, if they’re using crack it makes them a lot worse. I 

think we need to address that population because they’re the 

people whose houses become crack houses and they are 

vulnerable to exploitation by dealers.” 


The physical and mental health of persistent crack users is usually 

threatened by chaotic lifestyles and homelessness. Because the drug 

is so compulsive, and users so dedicated to sustaining the high, 

persistent use is much less compatible with normal life than persistent 

heroin use. Crack users therefore rapidly become homeless, though 

they may not be sleeping rough on the streets. 

“Certainly homelessness is a recurring problem for 

problematic crack users. Either because they don’t keep up 

their payments to keep the premises they’ve got and they 

become homeless, or because they have their premises 

taken over by dealers and it becomes a crack house and 

they become homeless as a result. Or because they go to 

prison and the tenancy doesn’t get paid after a certain time 

and they become homeless. Then they get into this cycle of 

temporary accommodation, short stays in prison, and people 

rotate on that for up to ten years.” 


“The ‘hidden homeless’ aren’t seen sleeping on the streets. 

They are sofa hopping from one flat to another, ending up in 

a crack house for a while, then going to a friend, then ending 

up in another crack house. I think accommodation issues 



38 

have a lot to do with it.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

As the GLA notes in its document on drugs in London, using crack is a 

vicious circle⎯it increases need for social services but tends to reduce 

their accessibility. “Social exclusion can be a consequence as well as a 

cause of problem drug use. Problem drug users are likely to find 

themselves increasingly cut off from mainstream services such as 

housing and health. This exclusion may then lead to their drug use 

becoming even more problematic, and the exclusion they face even 

more severe.” 18 

For some of the reasons noted above, crack use is conspicuous in a 

way that other drug use is not and gives rise to greater anxiety 

amongst the public and greater insistence that something be done. 

Other drug users may be more numerous and account for as much 

criminality, but politicians and law enforcement are under particular 

pressure to tackle crack. 

“Crack cocaine is what people perceive as being the problem 

because the people who are using it are the facade of drugs, 

the front. They are the thorn in the side of the local resident, 

business premises, and so on. The coke snorting and 

cannabis smoking that takes place inside private premises 

predominantly⎯because it is hidden it is not perceived as 

the greater problem as compared to crack. That is what 

troubles me... I ask myself why am I not working just as hard 

to deal with drugs inside night-clubs. Because there is as big 

a market inside a night-club and probably a more lucrative 

one, where there is less chance of being caught as there is 

on the streets. Now it is because of what the community 

want us to take action on. Where do we get the majority of 

legitimate complaints? From neighbours of crack houses. 

Where do we have the majority of illegality taking place? I 

would suspect there is a lot more coke being shifted, snorting 

on toilet seats in night-clubs than there are users on the 

streets... 

“People are not that bothered about what takes place behind 

closed doors. What they don’t want to do is to bring their 

children out at 8am on their way to school or come out at the 

weekend and see syringes, blood, tissues, foil, condoms and 

the like... Parks. If you walk your dog in that park or if you 

live with your back door onto that park you are going to go 

berserk at the fact that the police will tolerate this.” 


18 GLADA 



39 

4. Crack and cocaine 

It is cocaine rather than crack that is smuggled into the UK. Far more 

cocaine is consumed (usually snorted, sometimes injected) as cocaine 

than as crack, and there are many more cocaine users than crack 

users. 

There is concern in some quarters that cocaine users will become 

crack users. 

“I think it (the crack problem) might get worse, because there 

is a significant amount of cocaine floating around... They will 

be using crack by sort of buying their cocaine and then 

cooking it up themselves. That’s a trend we are seeing... 

Once they’ve used cocaine for a while, they are going to be 

in a state at one stage where they’re willing to try crack. If an 

associate of theirs cooks up a little bit of cocaine to produce 

crack at a party... If you can get a cocaine rush by smoking, 

then I think they’re going to go for it... All you need is a 

spoon, a bit of cocaine, a bit of bicarbonate of soda and a 

microwave.” 


But most of those working with drug users believe that crack and 

cocaine represent two quite distinct user groups. Cocaine is taken by 

large numbers recreationally, typically at weekends and very often in 

clubs or pubs. For most of its users, cocaine is a dressing up and 

going out drug; it seems to some extent to be taking over from ecstasy 

in this role. Black users of crack seem to migrate to it more from 

cannabis that cocaine, and most white users seem to arrive at crack 

via heroin or alcohol. The distribution networks for cocaine and crack 

are said to be quite distinct and most of those consulted for this study 

were confident that migration from cocaine to crack was not happening 

to any significant extent. 

“Crack dealers don’t sell cocaine... I can’t see those 

suburban people who have good jobs and take a little 

cocaine at the weekend when they’re going out, I can’t see 

those people becoming crack heads... Crack, when you are 

using it, you’re sort of taken over by it. At a club, on cocaine, 

dancing – it’s not like being on crack. To service yourself as 

a crack user is like a fulltime job.” 


“South Bank University were doing some research into crack 

houses in Waltham Forest... The crack users who they were 

talking to could not tell you where to buy cocaine. Absolutely 

could not... We don’t seem to be seeing cocaine users 



40 

graduating to crack use in the same way they saw it in the 

States, or cocaine users graduating to methamphetamine... 

At the moment it seems to be very distinct... I worry that it 

may happen but probably I worry about their alcohol use 

more.” 


There is nevertheless an argument that cocaine is the problem that 

needs to be solved because it is in cocaine importation that the really 

serious money is made. It is very difficult to imagine a significant 

rolling back of crack supply, and therefore crack use, without effective 

action to reduce quantities of cocaine arriving in the UK. 

5. Crack houses 

“I really strongly believe that you can’t talk about crack 

without talking about cocaine. It’s possibly a bit of a mistake 

in the way some of the central thinking is going, that crack is 

the problem. Actually cocaine is the problem. The 

wholesale market is all about cocaine, and crack is produced 

locally to where it’s used. It only ever exists for a short 

period of time... What underlies the crack market is the 

wholesale part of the cocaine market. But cocaine is still 

very hidden. Although it has now moved from being an 

expensive drug with a very wealthy profile to being a working 

class pub drug... It has replaced ecstasy in some extent in 

the club scene, so it is very much there.” 


5.1 What are they? 

The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea Crack House Protocol 

defines crack houses as follows: “a residential premises typically 

characterised by a combination of the following indicators: 

• the supply of cocaine in its derivative form known as ‘crack’ 

• the supply of other Class A drugs in combination with or in 

addition to cocaine 

• the communal consumption of ‘crack’ cocaine and ancillary 

drugs within the premises or within the vicinity of the address 

concerned 

• the ‘frequenting’ of the premises by identified sex workers; 

combined with the use of the premises or its vicinity for paid sex 

work 

• premises visited by a substantial number (greater than 10) of 

people on a daily basis in connection with the intended supply, 

purchase or consumption of Class A drugs 

• the criminal damage of surrounding property or the structure of 

an estate 



41 

• an increase in acquisitive and violent crime in the vicinity of the 

premises, linked to the funding of personal drug consumption 

• requests for police to respond to firearm incidents and violent 

assaults either inside the premise or in its vicinity 

• a series of complaints by local residents, detailing obscene or 

violent anti-social behaviour by the Tenant or the Tenant’s 

visitors 

• the intimidation of local residents, housing officers and local 

employees” 

There seems to be a good measure of agreement that the above 

definition, and the thinking that informs it, is basically right. 

“Premises where the drugs are both sold and consumed. 

That is what I call a crack house and it’s a place where 

typically you can exchange sex for crack, you can exchange 

stolen goods for crack, you can exchange money for crack. 

You can provide the sex services you’re using to pay for your 

crack in the house as well. A punter can turn up and buy sex 

and crack together. That’s what I call a crack house.” 


A number of ancillary points about crack houses may be worth noting. 

They are not normally the places where cocaine is transformed into 

crack. This usually happens elsewhere. 

“The crack house is generally a place where people go to 

smoke crack. They are not manufacturing it on the premises 

and they are not dealing...Perhaps a little bit of dealing but 

not much... Then you have other places or other addresses 

which are actually supplying or making it up from the address 

or holding it at the address and they are not crack houses.” 


One or two informants in this study said that some crack houses do 

produce crack on the premises, but it is the buying and using which 

defines the territory, rather than the production. 

“The stereotypical crack house will be a place where people 

can go to, acquire crack and smoke the crack. It could be 

cottage industry type, where they make cocaine into crack 

cocaine, which doesn’t take a massive process to do.” 


In most crack houses, many people say that drugs other than crack will 

also be being bought and used. 

“I’m sure they’re also used for heroin. It’s about heroin. It’s 

not just about crack... Heroin and crack and cannabis.” 




42 

That crack houses are normally located in residential areas is crucial to 

the problems they cause. Crack houses are ordinary dwellings 

situated amidst other ordinary dwellings and disrupting the lives of 

ordinary people. 

“Crack houses, what are we talking about? We’re talking 

about accommodation in residential areas... where people go 

to use drugs. And those drugs may be crack cocaine and 

heroin. And to some extent to buy... It’s actually about 

dealing with the noise, the nuisance, the disorder, the chaos 

and all that side of it as much as saying⎯is crack being used 

here? Because the key thing about crack houses is they’re 

in residential areas. 


“It’s just an ordinary flat,,, And that’s half the problem, 

because an ordinary person lives in an ordinary block with 

ordinary neighbours and they’re the people who suffer.” 


Some crack houses concentrate on dealing and there is little or no 

using. They are often fortified, and only intimates are admitted. 

“They are running a business there. In certain circumstances 

they will fortify the property. And so if there is a raid then it 

gives them time to dispose of their crack.” 


However, some people with considerable experience say that it is not 

typical for dealers to work in a crack house; people buy it from street 

dealers operating close by and go to the crack house to use. 

“The idea that a crack house is somewhere you can buy your 

drugs, that is a myth... You buy your drugs in Kings Cross... 

You want to consume it and you know there’s a crack house 

round the corner. You go and knock and go in and also 

they’d be used for prostitution as well.” 


The question arises⎯why do we talk about ‘crack houses’ when we do 

not talk about ‘heroin houses?’ The answer to this seems to have a 

number of elements. It is rare for crack to be the only drug used in a 

‘crack’ house⎯heroin might be the primary drug. 

“When we say crack houses, it might be used for heroin or 

crack.” 




43 

But crack is a stimulant and heroin a depressant; this may mean that 

most users like to be with other users (although it is not uncommon for 

a crack user to use on his or her own). 

“When you’re using a stimulant you need to chat⎯gabba 

gabba gabba. The worse thing you can do is sit there all by 

yourself. You need to distract yourself and engage with 

other people.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

“There is a social element to crack use and abuse in a way 

that you don’t find with heroin, where generally people are 

quite isolated.” 


Crack use, as already noted, often takes the form of binges, and is less 

compatible with normal life than is heroin use. Crack houses develop 

in part because crack users often need somewhere to use, and are in a 

great hurry to use. Moreover many crack users are homeless; they 

use crack houses as places to be. 

“A crack house to me, the way people stereotypically talk 

about it, is a place of desperation. It’s a dirty, not very 

pleasant place, with people who primarily are homeless, who 

are being manipulated, but their addiction to this drug is so 

great that this is the place that they need to be... There is a 

huge homeless issue around all drug users, especially crack 

users, and that’s why they home into places like the crack 

houses.” 


Crack is associated with disordered lives to a greater extent than 

heroin, and crack houses are in part an expression of this disorder. 

“‘Crack house’ immediately conjures up a really frightening, 

dangerous place to be, and I do think there is a distinction 

between where people go and use heroin and where they go 

to use crack. If you go to people’s houses, who are using 

heroin, even if they are a dealer they might still be living in a 

relatively functional situation. In a crack house you don’t get 

a family managing to live together as a family, send the kids 

to school and stuff.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

Because of the compulsiveness of crack (see above, section 2), and 

the consequent, incessant pressure to raise money, crack is 

associated with crime and prostitution to a yet greater extent than is 

heroin. One of the functions of many crack houses is to provide a 

place where sex can be sold (see also section 5.2 and 5.3, following). 



44 

There are certainly crack users who never, or very rarely, visit crack 

houses; they buy their crack from street dealers whom they contact by 

phone. It seems to be unclear to what degree crack use would abate if 

all crack houses were successfully closed. Some people working on 

the crack problem believe that the status of the ‘crack house’ in the 

public mind has been built up partly to demonise the drug, to 

depersonalise the crack problem, and to justify extreme measures 

against crack houses. 

“I believe that what we are trying to do is demonise the 

people who are using crack and portray them in a very 

negative, extreme way. So you remove any sense of them 

being vulnerable and in need so you can then steam in there 

without feeling any sense of maybe we need to be gentle 

about this... Twenty fully armed police beating down a door... 

because ‘it’s crack’. The idea of a crack house is it makes 

that kind of behaviour seem justified. Usually, you’ll find it is 

actually quite a pitiful and sad place the people are in when 

they actually do burst down the doors.” 


5.2 How crack houses develop 

Conventional wisdom is that crack houses arise when a crack dealer or 

dealers take over the premises of a ‘vulnerable person’⎯that is, 

someone who has physical or mental incapacities, or is dependent on 

drugs or alcohol⎯and use the premises to sell crack. Very often the 

premises are then also used to sell both sex and stolen goods as 

clients raise money in order to buy crack. “What is a crack house?... 

Usually a flat that has been taken over for the purpose of making and 

smoking crack... In many instances the people who run the ‘crack 

house’ are unwanted guests of the flat’s legitimate occupier... They are 

able to remain by using intimidation and threats of extreme violence 

that underpins the crack trade.” 19 

“Crack dealers will muscle in on someone who’s a tenant and 

is quite vulnerable. They’ll use the crack house and start 

selling drugs from that crack house.” 


19 Alan Brown, MPS, quoted in Your Community, Your Problem. Crack Cocaine Conference, 

Birmingham, 24-25 June 2002, Conference Report 



45 

“Most crack houses are one-bedroomed flats... In many 

cases they are single men who have been in prison and may 

have drug problems in the past, and/or mental health 

problems. They’re really preyed upon by crack dealers. 

They could take over their property within a few weeks of 

them signing the tenancy. The bedroom becomes the 

preserve of the prostitutes they use and that’s all part of the 

equation.” 


“They will see a weakness in the estate or the community. 

That weakness could be a young mum, a single male adult 

who is not particularly well educated, something like that. It 

could be befriending him and all of a sudden, his door has 

been barricaded on the inside, lots of people are coming. 

Even there could be a gun on the premise. It is then by 

definition a crack house.” 


“You’ve got estates where half of it is run down and the 

youths find somebody they know is a bit weak, or actually 

needs some coke or crack themselves, and they 

think⎯’we’re taking over this gaff to sell crack out of’.” 


“We know that most of these people are vulnerable... They 

could be vulnerable because they’re drug users; it could be 

elderly, mental health issues, alcohol issues. Quite simply 

they’re vulnerable.” 


Some people think the stereotype can be misleading in that the 

‘vulnerable people’ are very often themselves crack users and more 

colluding than this appellation suggests. 

“There are (supposed to be) these poor exploited vulnerable 

tenants here, and then there’s all these rabid crack users, 

who are roaming inner city areas trying to latch onto these 

people... I don’t believe it works like that... Drug users... form 

very strong networks with each other and drug users... They 

use together, they share together and they network with each 

other... It just feels like we’re feeding a really, really unhelpful 

stereotype... I think it is nearly always the premises of 

someone who’s involved in using, who’s involved in 

prostitution... and it develops from that. They can be 

vulnerable as well... Crack houses develop in the areas 

where crack users are living you know.” 


“The vulnerable person and the crack user are quite often the 

same person.” 

DAT, Camden 

One or two informants in this study wanted to argue that crack houses 

were neither new, nor exclusive to crack. Vulnerable people have for 

many years had their accommodation taken over by people dealing 

drugs or engaged in other sorts of crime. 



46 

“They’ve probably always existed. I’m sure there has always 

been houses where you could go and buy heroin and use it, 

but because it’s crack... there’s probably a lot more noise. 

There’s a lot more trouble because of the nature of the 

drug... This whole thing about using vulnerable people. That 

is, I’m sure again, something that has always happened (eg 

with heroin).” 

DAT, Camden 

However, it is agreed that groups of crack users create ‘a lot more 

trouble’ in the immediate vicinity than do groups of users of other 

drugs. 

5.3 The problems associated with crack houses 

A crack house is expected to generate a big increase in the level of 

acquisitive crime, sometimes violent crime, in the neighbourhood 

where it is established. It is also associated with a high level of 

nuisance⎯noise, people coming and going at all hours, accumulations 

of rubbish, discarded syringes, etc. 

“People kind of fall out of a crack house and are immediately 

in a state where they are actively looking for money to get 

the next hit⎯actively seeking sexual punters, begging 

money, or committing robberies or shoplifting⎯all in the 

immediate vicinity of the crack house.” 


“You’ll see a rising level of some street crime in the 

immediate vicinity of these premises... Shoplifting... more 

people being mugged... So it has an impact on the 

immediate vicinity. And nearly always local residents are 

very tuned up to this. You know, people coming and going at 

all times of the day and night. Noise in the street. These are 

the kind of factors which identify premises as being used for 

supply and consumption and they’re all called crack houses.” 


A flat in a high rise block on an estate causes severe problems for 

everyone else in the block. Users will be ‘buzzed in’ and will use 

stairwells to inject, defecate, and mug other tenants. Needles and 

other detritus will be left on landings and in lifts. Tenants may be too 

frightened to leave their flats, or to return to them. 

“I’ve had an old lady phone me in tears because she wanted 

a pint of milk and they were on the stairwell and she couldn’t 

get out... If affects everybody, your quality of life. You can’t 

go out anymore and if you’re out you can’t get home. I know 

over in (a block on the estate) one lady spent four nights out 

of her flat.” 



47 

TOO FRIGHTENED TO GO BACK? 

“Yes, she stayed with a friend... Why should people have to 

live like that, God help us.” 


All four of the boroughs visited had policies aimed at ensuring that 

crack houses were identified and closed as quickly as possible as a 

matter of priority. They were satisfied that closing crack houses led 

reliably to significant reductions in local crime. 

“One of the analysts at Streatham did a study last year on 

two addresses there. There was a phenomenal decrease in 

burglary and robbery around the area of general thefts once 

we closed the crack houses. It was unbelievable. It swayed 

a lot of hardened CID officers. They were a bit sceptical 

about the link between crack houses and the rest of the 

crime, but it just proved it.” 


Crack houses have a very disruptive effect on their immediate 

neighbours because of the constant noise and activity at all hours of 

the day and night. If there is a flat in a housing estate that is a crack 

‘house’, life becomes comprehensively more difficult for many residents 

on the estate. Users and dealers will come onto the estate: dealers 

may hide stashes in bushes (sometimes booby-trapping them with 

needles); users will leave needles in stairwells and everywhere else; 

users may well inject where they can be seen; the incidence of public 

urination, vomiting and defecation will increase; when drains and 

gutters are blocked plumbers will have to take care that they do not 

injure themselves on discarded needles; there will be a noticeable 

increase in litter; residents will be propositioned by drug dependent sex 

workers. 

Crack houses (and crack use) are also associated with prostitution. 

Sex workers based at crack houses cause distress and outrage by 

soliciting or performing sex acts in doorways. Residents of a road or 

an estate containing a crack house will be propositioned for sex. 

“I did open my front door one morning to find a 13 year old 

giving someone a blow job in full view of the street... I see 

girls in Brixton touting for business and six months later 

they’re completely raddled and obviously very poorly. It’s 

appalling.” 




48 

Areas previously known for prostitution, where there is now a lot of 

crack use, find that the number of sex workers increases, sometimes 

dramatically, and the nature of the prostitution changes. 

“Fifteen years ago there was lots of sex workers in Kings 

Cross and it wasn’t related to the drugs market, but now all 

the sex workers down there are like 99% of them will be on 

crack cocaine or heroin, so that’s what’s changed. First and 

foremost, they’re drug users.” 


Women who finance a crack habit by sex work are often in an 

especially desperate situation. The crack house may be their only 

accommodation and the only place they can work. They are effectively 

paid in crack so their chances of breaking away from the habit are 

poor. 

“A lot of prostitutes have nowhere else to go.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

“What you find with working women is that they are literally 

either on the streets or in crack houses. They are not getting 

any sleep. They’re going crazy and don’t have time to stop 

and think. If they did want to change what they are doing, 

there’s very little opportunity.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

“Some of the crack houses are also used as prostitute 

accommodation, as ‘cat houses’... Very often when the police 

or housing go to visit a crack house to try and close it down, 

they find women there as well as paraphernalia...We don’t 

really know what comes first but we think it’s always the 

drugs that comes first and the drugs then attract other 

people.” 


In some locations the link between crack and sex work is such that the 

prices of sex services are said to move in tandem with the price of 

crack. 

“The charges that prostitutes make in this area is related to 

the price of crack. If the price of crack goes down, the cost 

of their charges also goes down. You are not talking about 

high price prostitutes round here.” 


We have not looked comprehensively at what is being done to help 

crack-dependent sex workers, but an initiative in Lambeth is worth 

noting briefly. A ‘Working Women’s Project’ has been set up, and one 

component of it is ten easy access beds in a large hostel for the 



49 

homeless. Unusually, women using these beds are allowed to carry on 

working whilst they are there. 

“It gives them an opportunity to get a bit of sleep, to spend 

time with specialists and actually start thinking about what 

they are doing... That’s a really unusual project and I think it 

really highlights the need for there being somewhere where 

women can just get away and get a bit of time.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

5.4 Closing crack houses; policies, difficulties, benefits 

All four boroughs visited have policies in place governing what is 

supposed to happen when a crack house is identified. The RBKC 

Crack House Protocol appears to have been a model for several other 

boroughs. All protocols and action plans emphasise the importance of 

rapid action. However, a complex set of procedures usually has to be 

adhered to for a crack house to be closed. We have heard different 

accounts of exactly what these need to be and our understanding of 

them is incomplete. Everything is easier if the legal tenant is willing to 

be re-housed, at least temporarily. 

“If you’ve got a vulnerable person and they agree to move 

out into temporary accommodation, that’s the best answer... 

You just go in, ask the (other) people to move⎯they’re 

illegally there⎯and shut it down. If the person is vulnerable 

and they say they’d don’t want to move... then you’ve got a 

problem, you’ve got to take legal action.” 


There is also a difference in procedure if the ambition is to convict drug 

dealers as opposed to merely evicting occupants and terminating a 

tenancy⎯the level of proof needed to mount a criminal prosecution is 

more difficult to secure than that needed to be successful in a civil 

action. 

“You need evidence that they’re doing that [selling drugs]. 

You can’t just go crashing in, on suspicion that it might be a 

crack house. Evidence will normally take some time to 

gather. You may need undercover police officers to actually 

go there and buy drugs, as proof. We have to prove beyond 

all reasonable doubt that someone is selling drugs from 

those premises. Unless we have evidence we can’t just raid 

the premises or get a search warrant.” 


“It can’t be anecdotal, it has to be solid information from a 

police officer. This is not beyond all reasonable doubt, it is 

not a criminal case but it has to be on the balance of 



50 

probabilities. You are going to have to show what I call 

predisposition, video footage of people going into the house 

and within a very small amount of time, going away... You 

are not giving a massive watertight package to the courts. 

But you are giving a very good display that this house is 

being used for this sort of activity. If you get people coming 

in 20, 30 or even 40 an hour. In they go, stay for a short time 

and coming away, on the balance of probability, what are 

they doing in there? You present that to Westminster City 

Council and they then can say ‘This is being used as a crack 

house we have authority to close it down’.” 


Closing crack houses is expensive. Conducting the quality of 

surveillance needed to mount a successful criminal prosecution is very 

demanding on police time, as are the court proceedings. Looking for 

ways to cut costs and reduce demands on police time, Lambeth has 

successfully used a commercial surveillance company in at least one 

crack house closure. Anti-Social Behaviour Orders (ASBOs) are 

sometimes seen, in Camden particularly, as a more economical way of 

restricting the activities of users and dealers (see below, pages 70,71). 

“The amount of money that the police can spend on covert 

activities... You go in with the wire on... but you have to have 

video evidence that somebody is dealing before you 

approach them as a police officer pretending to buy off them 

because otherwise they put up a defence in court⎯they 

never thought about being on drugs before they were 

approached by this nasty policeman. And then you have to 

buy off them two or three times I think. Imagine how long 

that takes, setting up a relationship so that they trust you... 

But with Anti-Social Behaviour Orders, you can have 

evidence from other residents saying that there are people 

coming up at all hours of the night and they make a lot of 

noise. You can have Housing Officer evidence, you can use 

CCTV evidence...” 

DAT, Camden 

“Every time you go to court to evict someone it is three or 

four thousand quid. And you have lost rent.” 


Attempts to close crack houses, even if carefully planned, often fail to 

produce any convictions or even arrests. 

“The police can’t take effective action because... in a crack 

house you’ve got lots of people who are stoned or are under 

the influence and what can they arrest them for? Very, very 

rarely they find substantial supplies... The moment the police 

decided to close them down, what they’ve come up against 

was the fact that the people using the premises, there was 

insufficient evidence to actually arrest them and charge 

them. 




51 

“They had a couple of crack houses in Dumbarton Court by 

New Park Road and the police went in and did a dawn raid 

and all this kind of stuff. They got rid of them. By the 

afternoon they’d come back! Crack dealers are very clever 

and very connected to mobile phones and various new 

technology... Most of the time they actually know when the 

police are raiding, so... they've got no stash, there is no 

evidence of any kind of drugs.” 


Closing, or attempting to close, crack houses can also create problems 

for police-community relations. Because of the speed with which drugs 

and drugs paraphernalia can be disposed of, operations have to be 

swift and sudden if any useful evidence is to be collected. Such 

operations are alarming to witness, and are especially sensitive if the 

suspected crack house is in a predominantly black area and most of 

the police are white. 

“With all the subtleties of police operations, relations with 

ethnic minorities, the last thing they want to do is go mobhanded 

into an estate, start knocking people’s doors down.” 


The necessity of mounting expensive police operations is sometimes 

disputed. Some crack houses, it is argued, collapse from lack of 

business if the police make it known they are watching the premises; 

users prefer to avoid it and go somewhere else. 

“The thing with crack houses and the people that frequent it 

is that they will always have a couple of addresses so all you 

need to do sometimes is to put a notice on the door saying 

‘police aware’... The police are looking at it and that might be 

enough to get rid of the problem.” 


The RBKC Protocol states that “there is a target time scale of closing a 

‘crack house’ within 42 days of key partnership agencies recognising 

its existence”. An informant in Lambeth said that there was usually a 

period of six to seven weeks between a crack house being confidently 

identified and it being effectively closed. Getting a result in this time 

requires close co-ordination between police, housing departments and 

legal teams. 

“The police would raid a property and it would get boarded 

up by the local housing office. Then lo and behold they 

would see the tenant go back in because we didn’t have a 

possession order. A lot of the time the police thought⎯’what 

the hell is going on?’ So it is a process of explaining that if 

we haven’t got a possession order and someone turns up we 



52 

have to let them back in. But what we need to do is speed 

up the process of going to court and getting possession, so 

we have legal services on board... We have got it down. If 

everything goes smoothly, to about six weeks, which is about 

the minimum... And that is really important because people, 

residents, want to see things happen quickly.” 


It is occasionally claimed that much more rapid action is possible... 

“Once it has been hit, then the place is closed down that 

day.” 

THAT DAY? 

“Yes, once we have hit it, it is closed down straightaway. We 

would hit it with the CATS (Community Action) Team and 

also with the Council... So it gets closed that day... At one 

time we were seen to be a little bit slow and I think we have 

changed that.” 


The length of time typically needed to close a crack house, even if no 

prosecutions are intended, is a source of frustration to many. Not the 

least of the frustrations is that the benefits of closure, except to those 

living very close by, often seem transitory or marginal. Dealers and 

users move on to other premises, sometimes very nearby. 

“Even if you are not a proper tenant and just squatting there, 

it still takes time for landlords to go through the courts, pay 

money, just to evict you. It's just legal niceties and appeals 

and what have you. I don’t know what the legislation is but it 

would be nice to have some sort of legislation that if you can 

prove it is a crack house to say ‘it's closed’. Bars on the 

windows and doors, no one can come in here. But that is 

quite Draconian and... all that happens is you are displaced 

and you go somewhere else.” 


“Once you’ve got a kind of close-knit network of people in a 

local area, they just move into another premises... What you 

don’t want is a closure of one premises leading to the 

demand just reappearing in another premises and another 

individual who’s involved in that network who allows their 

premises to be used." 


Declaring war on crack houses is seen by many as simply displacing 

the problem, sometimes within the borough, sometimes to 

neighbouring boroughs. There are those who think the attention paid 

to crack houses is excessive given how little is achieved by closing 

them. 

“You can close that door, but another one will open. They’re 

closing down crack houses in Camden. That’s their job and 



53 

they’re doing it well, but if you really think that that’s going to 

solve the problem, I think that’s naive.” 


Part of the argument here is that attention ought to shift more towards 

the people involved⎯both the ‘vulnerable people’ whose premises 

often become crack houses, and also the crack users. The vulnerable 

people need the sort of help that might prevent them falling victim to 

dealers; users need all sorts of help, including, often, housing. 

“Most people who live in council housing, unless you’ve got 

children, are vulnerable people. It’s quite easy to get into 

vulnerable people’s households, even without them being 

hooked on drugs... They’ll just listen to you and they are 

preyed upon. Either they are older people who may just 

crave company, or they are 18 year old single mums... The 

drug dealers are like bogus callers. They get a foot in the 

door and they stay there, they take over your entire thing... 

The police and housing officers have gone into properties 

where they’ve turned into crack houses and the person is 

actually subdued into almost nothing, the person whose 

property it is... So for us to sit in positions of authority and 

say⎯’ get rid of them’. Well, you can’t, not when they are 

like 70 or when they are eighteen and they should have had 

a support worker working with them to settle them in... A lot 

of the time, because of the pressures and under resourcing 

of the borough, what happens is that nobody is working with 

that young kid or that single mum or that older person.” 


“There is this sense that we need more tools in our armoury 

to take action against these houses and close them down... 

We’ve got to move away from closing down houses. The 

people are important, and where are they going to?” 


On the other hand, the public is often outraged by the apparent 

indifference of the police and local authorities to premises which so 

conspicuously give rise to persistent nuisance and crime. Leaving 

crack houses alone is liable to create an impression in the public mind 

that drug use is out of control and the authorities have given up. 

Closing them is therefore important for this reason alone. 

“Closing a crack house is a very visible sign of success, and 

it’s as much about being seen to be doing something as 

about doing something.” 




54 

6. Communications between the authorities and the public about 

crack 

An hypothesis at the inception of this project was that the authorities 

might be able to take quicker and more effective action against crack 

houses if local residents recognised the early signs of one developing 

and were encouraged to contact the police or local authority housing 

department. Residents of the four boroughs visited were asked about 

this. Their reactions are reported more fully in section 10 below, but, in 

brief, no-one appeared to believe that better channels of 

communication from the public to the authorities, about dealers or 

crack houses, were likely to make any significant difference. 

One or two professional informants placed considerable emphasis on 

the need to involve local communities if drug problems were to be 

effectively addressed. They had in mind something beyond merely 

encouraging the public to ring the police if they saw what they thought 

was drug dealing or drug related crime. “Involving residents is not just 

about gathering intelligence; it is the cornerstone of effective practice 

against drug markets. Local people need a sense of being engaged in 

policing and other action against crack markets. This helps deal with 

potential resistance and disorder that can ensue from drugs raids. It is 

essential to engage the trust of residents and provide multiple channels 

of communication for them to use.” 20 

It is argued by some that sustainable long term reductions in crack use 

will most reliably come from community-based initiatives. Those who 

think this want local authorities to encourage the public to come 

forward, not just with information about dealing, but also with ideas for 

what leisure facilities are needed, or are in need of repair, or what 

might be done to improve the residential environment generally. 

Estates blighted by drug use will not improve until residents come to 

have some sense of ownership of, and even pride in, the common 

spaces. It is enormously difficult to overcome the bunker mentality 

which, in many areas, has existed for years, and imbue estate 

residents with a greater sense of involvement and commitment. 


Home Office 



55 

Most of the professionals knowledgeable about crack took a similar 

view to the residents. The Head of the Drugs Directorate of the 

Metropolitan Police said that he thought “the public are helping the 

police as much as they can about crack houses”. Although intimidation 

is often acknowledged to be a problem (see further below) the general 

opinion is that the public do contact the authorities as soon as they 

notice drug-related activity in their neighbourhoods. It is sometimes 

argued that crack houses are so conspicuous, the authorities always 

come to know of them within a few days. 

“You don’t have to worry about knowing about crack houses. 

The authorities get to know about crack houses because, 

you know, you could have 100 visitors in a 24 hour period.” 


The popular perception is assumed to be (rightly, on the basis of these 

findings) that the public inform the police but, often, nothing is done. 

“Many neighbours suffering from having to live near to a crack house 

are frustrated by what they see as the lack of decisive action. 

Gathering sufficient evidence to prove that drug dealing is taking place 

within a property and attributing that activity to a specific individual is 

extremely difficult.” 21 

A sizeable website⎯crackcocaineincamden.co.uk⎯has been created, 

apparently by a member or members of the public, detailing the extent 

and nature of the problem in the borough. This site seems to be an 

attempt to prompt, and assist, police and local authority action, and is 

perhaps also a cry of frustration. 

So the public is usually believed to communicate adequately well with 

authority. People are not, however, thought to understand the 

procedures that need to be followed in order to close a crack house, 

and are therefore unsympathetic to the almost inevitable delay. The 

public is also believed by many (but not all, see pages 76,77) to make 

closing crack houses and arresting dealers a strong priority. Their 

communications with authority are dominated by complaints about 

crack houses and street dealing. The public, at least in its 

communications with authority, neglects the less conspicuous work, 


Home Office 



56 

especially by social services, that needs to be done to try and ensure 

that the problem is not simply displaced to another locality or another 

house. 

“Quite often the public are alert to the problem. It’s normally 

the public who are the first to alert the police. Quite often 

publicity raises expectations that are not then met by the 

police or the local authority response. That was our real 

problem with this... You’re not going to be able to raid every 

crack house. We need evidence of use and of dealing on 

these premises... There’s very rarely going to be an instant 

response. Which means that you end up with someone who 

is very disappointed, particularly if they live next door to it.” 


“Local residents call the local authority and they complain 

about the noise and they complain about rubbish... And 

they’ll call the police and they’ll say⎯’look, we think this is a 

crack house’... My understanding, from talking to residents’ 

associations across London, is the problem isn’t that local 

residents are unaware of crack houses. The problem is in 

terms of getting a quick response from the public services 

but also getting a sustainable response from public 

services... There’s a real tension at the moment between 

being able to respond quickly to crack houses... and being 

able to respond... in terms of what happens around the 

rehousing, supported housing needs of the vulnerable tenant 

or person whose accommodation we’re talking about... I’ve 

never, never come across a concern that there isn’t sufficient 

local resident awareness about crack houses.” 


Many people living in high crack areas, especially of course those who 

live on estates or in roads with crack houses, have a sense of outrage 

about what drug users do. They feel clear that there is gross and 

flagrant injustice in a small minority within a community causing such 

distress and anxiety to the large majority. It seems a nonsense to them 

that the police are apparently unable to do anything effective to stop 

behaviour which everyone knows is illegal. The difficulties the 

authorities face are not appreciated and the law is not understood. 

Many of the public do not understand why prison is not the answer to 

the problems drug users cause. 

“They’re not going to be sent to prison for this offence, so 

they’re not going to be taken out of your life. They are going 

to be given a fine, they may be put on a community order, 

but they’re not going to be sent to prison for possession or, 

you know, for consorting with other crack users.” 




57 

The more pressing need is often identified as better communications 

from the authorities to the public rather than the other way about. It is 

widely acknowledged that the authorities need to explain the difficulties 

they face in closing crack houses. They need also to build public 

understanding of the other issues⎯enforcement issues, but also 

housing and treatment issues⎯that need to be addressed if the crack 

problem is to be effectively dealt with longer term. 

There has been some progress on these communications. Kensington 

and Chelsea are reported to have distributed an A4 flow chart to all 

residents explaining the various police and judicial procedures needed 

to evict people from crack houses. Westminster leaflet the immediate 

vicinity after a crack house has been closed, explaining the action that 

has been taken and why. Lambeth have put out police notices on the 

streets, much like those appealing for witnesses to accidents, letting 

the public know that a crack house in the vicinity has been closed. 

Lambeth has also conducted a Community Drugs Education 

Project⎯stalls in three shopping parades over several weeks giving 

out drugs education information. In 2000 Lambeth set up ‘The Crime 

Forum’, one of twelve working groups called The Brixton Area Forum 

with a remit to ‘consult, engage and scrutinise’. Its chair describes the 

Forum as “local government trying to engage local community workers 

and residents, all different people” but believes more needs to be done. 

“The council needs to open up far better channels so people 

feel far more confident about either being able to complain, 

or about phoning up and saying⎯’listen, I really want to do 

something about this, how do I go about it?’.” 


Other initiatives have been taken, or are planned, elsewhere in 

London. 

“If there is a crack house and it has been closed down we 

look to refit the area afterwards. We tell the people (by 

leafleting the area) and say there has been one here and we 

have done something about it.” 


“They (boards in the street) are partly to say that we are 

actually on the case, but also to say⎯’therefore, if you see 

something, it is actually worth telling us because we are 

going to do something about it.”” 

DAT, Lambeth 



58 

“You are not going to complain if you know nothing is going 

to happen...When a place gets hit we put a board up, like 

those for accidents, saying⎯’another crack house 

closed’⎯so residents know immediately we have been there 

and done something about it.” 


“There are going to be community awareness raising projects 

in Clapton... about crack use and what its effect is and how it 

works. Raising levels of awareness so... local residents will 

be more confident and understanding of what the police are 

doing and what the patterns of drug markets are and why 

things happen the way they do.” 


“(Project) Lilac... made the public aware that there were ways 

to talk to the police, formally and informally. Different 

meetings were set up with different community groups or 

business groups. That brought people together.” 


Brent has run an award-winning campaign⎯Not Another Drop⎯aimed 

in part at building public confidence that something can be, and is 

being, done about drugs. 

The need for confidence building is partly generic in the sense that 

many people do not have much trust in the authorities. Lack of trust 

may grow from suspicions of racism, or from the perception that 

nothing is ever efficiently done about anything. In some localities, 

cynicism is a factor discouraging public engagement with crack as an 

issue. 

“We’re talking about people living in communities where they 

have very little faith in public services... so maybe they just 

don’t bother calling... ‘What is the point in calling the police, 

they never do anything about this... They can’t even clean 

the bins, can’t even collect the rubbish’.” 


“A lot of the community still have a problem trusting the law 

enforcement in this country, and I think they’ll have to deal 

with that first before they move forward.” 


Lack of trust is also specific to crack as an issue, and feeds particularly 

on the perception that the police do not act on the intelligence they get 

from the public. The need for communicating with, and involving, the 

public, is widely acknowledged. It is less clear how this need is best 

met, but it seems clear that more needs to be done. 



59 

“You need to let the community know that there is a system, 

that there are guarantees, that there will be a response, that 

they’re not just doing it for nothing, that there is no way 

anyone can find out it was you, and that you are targeting the 

right people... Do the research first, so the community feels 

that they have been included in this and not had it foisted 

upon them... Have a mediator as well, someone who’s not in 

law enforcement or a policeman, that the community could 

go to. I think that would be a better system than going to the 

police, where there’s an element of mistrust.” 


“We’ve really got an issue with working with the community. 

We’ve really got to try... to bring them on board... One of the 

criticisms in Camden is that the police have de-prioritised 

drug use... Basically, what people do is they see people 

injecting and they ring the police and they go⎯’there’s 

someone injecting on the corner of so-and-so street... Well, 

by the time the police get there it’s injected, so they’re not 

even in possession of the drug. Injecting isn’t actually a 

crime. Being off your head isn’t a crime... So people feel like 

nothing’s being done because the police aren’t rushing out.” 

DAT, Camden 

Similarly, it is acknowledged that some police tactics need to be 

explained to the public. The need for surprise and speed in closing 

crack houses is one. Another is the tactic of jumping on suspected 

dealers in the street and attempting to prevent them swallowing or 

otherwise disposing of their drugs. 

“Best practice, when they’re doing street arrests, is to give 

people information about what they’re doing and why they’re 

doing it. Because it looks very violent if a police officer grabs 

someone in the street and wrestles them to the ground and 

shouts. It doesn’t look like what you want to see the police 

doing, if you don’t understand the context.” 


It is often argued (and many of the residents interviewed confirmed, 

see section 10) that fear of intimidation, is an important factor 

discouraging the public from contacting the authorities about drug 

related activities. 

“When (drugs) comes up, residents are very, very afraid. 

They’re afraid to tell the Housing Officer, afraid to tell the 

police. The police or Housing Officers are not always 

discreet in how they talk and how they deal with people.” 

Community Housing Officer, Westminster 

“The problem is encouraging people to complain to the 

police. There’s a lot of fear surrounding drugs, even talking 

to us sometimes. People do not want to be involved. 

There’s a lot of violence attached to any kind of drug use. 

People just don’t want to be brought into the equation.” 




60 

Fear of having to give evidence in court (and thus identify themselves) 

is an important element in this fear. Police and housing officials are 

aware of this, though they also believe it to be misplaced. 

“Neighbours may think it is drugs, but they are not going to 

say anything because they think they might have to go to 

court and they don’t want to be known. So we try and do 

everything on the assumption that we don’t ask witnesses.” 


“What they are afraid to do is come and give evidence. We 

had one across the road... a lease holder... In the end we got 

it back from forfeiture, which is quite unusual, but I had 

twenty-five people over there, very articulate people, and 

none of them wanted to come and give evidence... They 

think it is more dangerous that it is, and I know from 

experience... The guy who lived there was vulnerable. He 

wouldn’t do anything to them. The people that visited, they 

wouldn’t turn up in court. They wouldn’t know who was 

giving evidence. It’s not like that. It doesn‘t work like that.” 


The website referred to above⎯ crackcocaineincamden.co.uk⎯ 

mentions that a proportion of those who e-mailed the site asked for 

their e-mails not to be posted because they feared reprisals. Clearly 

intimidation is sometimes a factor discouraging members of the public 

from getting in touch with the authorities. 

“I went to him (a local resident) and said⎯‘I'm led to believe 

there's people selling drugs from your place.’ He 

said⎯’Bloody amateur, it's taken you long enough!’ I 

said⎯’But why didn’t you tell me?’⎯because I really knew 

him very well; I’d watched his kids grow up. He said⎯’I'm 

the only one who lives upstairs and if I tell you then you don’t 

have to be very bright to think⎯the guy upstairs has grassed 

me up.’ So he hadn't said anything but he then let me have 

the keys so that we could get in without smashing the front 

doors down.” 


There is apparently a scheme under which witnesses are paid to give 

evidence. We do not know if this is meeting with any success in 

getting members of the public to come forward. 

“I think that intelligence (from the public) is used a lot more 

now and I know that one of the things they were looking at 

spending money on was the ‘paying witnesses scheme’, or 

whatever it’s called, where you actually pay people for their 

information.” 

DAT, Lambeth 



61 

It may be that the perceived failure of the police to respond to 

information from the public helps account for the reluctance to give 

evidence; some of the public comes to feel the police are not to be 

relied on. 

“What happens is, you get ‘Mrs Smith’ up the road who’s 

terrified of these people and finally plucks up the courage to 

ring and nothing happens. Now she might do it another 

couple of times, but after that she may not want to get 

involved. And when they go up to her and say⎯’will you give 

us a statement?’⎯she things⎯’you didn’t even come round 

when I phoned up, don’t expect me to stick my neck out to 

give you a statement when I know already you can’t 

respond’.” 


There is some evidence also, that people think first of calling their local 

police station, or dialling 999, and that anonymous phone lines may not 

be sufficiently top of mind with some of the public. 

“I am hoping that the community knows that there are many 

different ways of making an inform on the crack house next 

door. They don’t have to tell the police. They can ring Crime 

Stoppers. They can tell the local council through the local 

council offices anonymously.” 


Anonymous lines of communication do not help, clearly, if people fear 

drug dealers will suspect them because of where they live or where 

they were at a particular time. 

It is very difficult to know to what extent fear of reprisals inhibits the 

flow of intelligence from public to police. On the one hand, many 

members of the public say that they call the authorities repeatedly 

about crack houses, drug use and dealer. On the other hand, many 

also say that they fear being identified as people who complain to the 

police. Our confident assumption is that fear of reprisal greatly 

increases if the information is ‘privileged’ in the sense that it concerns 

family, friends, or close neighbours. In other words, people who know 

that someone is a dealer through some personal connection, will be 

very much more reluctant to come forward with information than 

someone who happens to notice something that any number of others 

may also have noticed. People who are being disturbed by the noise 

of a lot of people coming and going from a crack house, are much 

more likely to call the police than someone whose daughter’s friend’s 



62 

boyfriend is dealing and has a gun. (See also residents’ views in 

section 10, below.) 

7. Crack prices and markets 

Some relatively small dealers may be involved in importation from the 

Caribbean, notably Jamaica, although the official view is that the bulk 

of cocaine coming into the country arrives via Europe in containers and 

is organised by big crime syndicates. “Street dealers may be involved 

in direct importation and the chain from Jamaica to the street is very 

short... Middle-market suppliers operate between street sellers and 

importers. However, the definition of a middle market is elastic. The 

boundaries between importers, middle-market suppliers and street 

dealers are quite fluid. Street dealers may sometimes replace the 

middle market and buy directly from importers.” 22 

It is not clear that how crack markets work is fully understood but a 

number of points deserve to be made. Because crack is so 

compulsive, it is important to users that crack is available and can be 

used quickly. This is one of the reasons why crack houses develop 

(see above, section 5.2). The way crack is distributed seems to reflect 

a need for many local ‘outlets’, so it is conveniently available without 

users having to travel too far. There appear to be many street or 

middle level dealers who service small patches of territory. They are 

contacted by phone, or by recognition on the street, and sell the drug in 

small quantities⎯a £10 (or even £5) rock per deal. It is widely agreed 

that prices now range between £5 and £10 whereas in 1999 they were 

between £10 and £15. 

Such low prices are one factor encouraging crack (and heroin) use. 

“Twenty years ago early everyone in the hostel across the 

road (Dean Street in Soho) was a drunk, because booze was 

the cheap way to get off your head to escape reality. Now 

nearly everyone there is taking crack or heroin or probably 

both.” 


22 Burgess, Robin 



63 

Street dealers carry very small amounts, often in their mouths, and this 

makes convictions for dealing difficult to achieve. Supplies for the next 

few deals seem to be hidden in bushes, abandoned or burnt out cars, 

stairwells, etc. Dealing in crack is characterised by lots of dealers and 

lots of small stashes. 

“In Stonebridge... people were using abandoned cars to hide 

the drugs in, and there was drugs stashed all round the 

estate.” 

DAT, Brent 

The number of dealers, and the consequent accessibility of crack, is a 

factor encouraging the growth in its use. Crack is tempting because it 

is ‘everywhere’. 

“It’s partly the availability which drives the use and it is very 

different from heroin.” 


Crack is everywhere in part because dealing it is so profitable. It also 

appears that the simplicity of the process of converting cocaine to 

crack, and the way the money works here, allows or encourages a 

large number of small operators. This in turn seems to have made it 

easy for street dealers in cannabis and heroin to sell crack either as 

well or instead. 

“It is not a factory but cottage industries, which is a very 

small room. All you need is a stove, a microwave, some thin 

film, a few bicarbonates and what have you and you can 

convert base cocaine into crack cocaine. Then you simply 

break it down, put it into rocks, crack the rocks and you are 

away.” 


“I’m not sure how organised the crack market is. My feeling 

is that it probably isn’t as organised as some studies 

suggest, partly because it’s easy to manufacture crack and it 

would be quite easy to sign up as a sole trader doing that 

kind of business.” 


“Part of an analysis around crack is to say it’s sort of piggy 

backed in terms of its distribution on the Jamaican weed 

market.” 


It is alleged that heroin dealers may tell their regular customers they 

have no heroin but they do have crack if he/she would like to try it. 



64 

Similarly some cannabis dealers are said to give away small rocks of 

crack to initiate regular cannabis users. 

“Long term heroin users will go to the dealer who they’ve 

been getting their heroin off and find that the dealer also has 

crack. And they say, you know⎯’try it’.” 


Many users say that crack dealers are typically black, with many of 

Caribbean origin. 23 Some informants in this study agree that this is the 

case, at least for street dealers. Blacks dominating street dealing to 

the extent that is often claimed would be more readily explicable if the 

bulk of cocaine coming into the country came directly from the 

Caribbean in relatively small quantities. The links there must 

presumably be between black street dealers and the major bulk 

importers of cocaine appear to be a mystery. 

“A lot of dealers in Kings Cross will be Jamaican, and a lot of 

the dealers up in Camden Town will be Gambian.” 


“This is a very, very delicate area to enter but I can with 

absolute confidence say that the stereotypical person who 

was supplying crack cocaine in Soho was young black males 

who stem from West Indies, Jamaica, the Caribbean. The 

last operation we conducted there was only concluded in the 

last three months, finally, the last conviction in court. There 

were 19 people who were... dealers in the street. Of those, 

around about 16 were young and black, three or four were 

female. A lot of those 16 had been in the country less than 

six months and their transfer from the Caribbean to Soho 

was financed by the players in Jamaica and this country.” 


Crack dealing is associated with violence. In Brixton there were five 

shootings within three months in 1999, though it is far from certain that 

these were all connected with crack. It is worth noting that crack 

markets do not inevitably generate violence. In some places⎯for 

example Soho⎯the number of users seems to be able to 

accommodate any number of street dealers. 

“Elsewhere... there would be massive territorial grounds for 

dealers. You could have a dealer in a particular area, who 

would be supported by minders. He would deal from that 

area. If anyone crossed his path, there would be significant 

outbreaks of violence. In Soho, it just didn’t happen. There 

was so much demand... they just overlaid each other.” 


23 See Cragg Ross Dawson Crack in the South East, forthcoming 



65 

Open crack markets⎯where it is easily possible to make contact with a 

dealer without being known or having an introduction⎯are believed to 

encourage new users because the drug is that much more readily 

accessible. Open markets also attract large numbers of users from 

outside the locality and these users commit crimes in the vicinity of the 

market. There have, in several parts of London, been mighty efforts to 

close open markets. For example, a formerly open market in 

Stonebridge (Brent) was broken in Sept 2001. Police action was 

followed by sustained programmes from different agencies working in 

partnership and aiming to regenerate the area. Initiatives included 

reclaiming community space and putting in activities for young people. 

The betting shop that had been the centre of dealing activity for a 

number of years was closed. In November 2002 Brent “closed the last 

big market we had” in Kensal Rise. Real benefits are associated with 

these market closures. 

“If you look at where... action has been taken, the levels of 

crime in that immediate area have dropped significantly... 

Look at what happened in Brent. Extraordinary high level of 

burglary, repeat burglary, victimisation, antisocial behaviour, 

street crime. When that market was taken away, and the 

dealers were taken away, then it dropped considerably. It 

actually dropped quite dramatically. Stonebridge is not a 

street crime hotspot, but it was before... The place is 100 

times better than it was.” 

DAT, Brent 

However other areas have not been able to close markets. Opinions 

on whether Brixton is an open or closed market seem to differ; the 

immediate area of the tube exit still exhibits many of the negative 

effects associated with an open market. 

“The tube is like walking into something from Breughel. It is 

chaotic and terrible. Full of rough sleepers, beggars, 

dealers, users, ticket touts... The underground is the hot spot 

for street robbery.” 


The markets around Charing Cross Road and Camden High Street are 

widely regarded as open and appear to defy closure. 



66 

“We feel that while there are such huge profits to be made in 

the dealing of drugs, it becomes very, very difficult to actually 

stop drug use... It’s been difficult to sort of shift these 

markets that we’ve got, whatever we do. We feel there 

needs to be some radical changes in drugs policies to do 

that.” 

DAT, Camden 

“Camden High Street you can buy what you like.” 


Camden DAT feel they have thought carefully about what to do, 

devoted resources to doing it, yet had negligible impact on the 

operations of a conspicuous drugs market. “Project Lilac has allowed 

us to focus £2 million of Targeted Policing Initiative funding on an area 

of approximately two square miles in the West End to pilot methods for 

permanently disrupting drug markets. Highly developed partnership 

working across agencies and across boroughs (in particular with the 

City of Westminster), has produced a greater understanding of the 

components of the drug market, some impact on the quality of life 

issues for West End communities, an impressive number of judicial 

disposals for drug supply crimes, and no discernible impact on the 

market.” 24 

8. Issues around enforcement 

8.1 What’s being tried, what recommended? 

Despite the difficulties described above (see section 5.4), the feeling 

amongst many professionals seems to be that progress is being made 

in relation to crack houses. Crack houses are by no means the only 

manifestation of the problem, but they are being closed and people 

who deal in drugs are being evicted. 

“In September (02) we had 84 crack houses in the borough 

we had identified. We have got it down to about 30. It is 

something you have to keep pressure on.” 


“The other thing is that people know they are going to lose 

their homes if they are involved in that (crack dealing) and 

Stonebridge Housing Action Trust (Brent) does evict people.” 

DAT, Brent 




67 

Crime rates in some areas are responding to crack house closures and 

other measures. 

“We have formed a drugs and firearms team. We have 

made fantastic reductions on robbery and burglary and we 

have reduced robbery by about 16% and reduced burglary 

by about 19%f in the year... These are massive reductions.” 


People working in DATs believe they have a good understanding of 

how crack houses develop; understand the social consequences of 

allowing them to develop; and have ideas on how they can be 

prevented from developing. These ideas include taking great care 

where vulnerable people are rehoused following rehabilitation, release 

from prison or closure of a crack house⎯avoiding areas where there is 

a lot of crack use, and premises which have characteristics (for 

example, multiple exits, not easily overlooked) that make them 

attractive to dealers. 

In this context many professionals also feel that understanding how 

problems develop is only a first step⎯resources are needed to 

translate this understanding into effective action, especially in relation 

to housing and rehabilitation. Vulnerable people are frequently housed 

inappropriately because housing availability is so limited. 

“If you’re put in a hostel in Kings Cross and you know you 

can go and get drugs in Kings Cross, it’s like putting a kid in 

a sweet shop.” 


There is cautious optimism in some quarters that progress is being 

made in restricting the activities of crack markets. New tactics in 

apprehending dealers on the street have already been mentioned and, 

though there is potential for negative reactions from the public, these 

tactics are said by some to be working. 

“There is now a system, a "hard search" or something, where 

certain policemen have been licensed to jump on people they 

think are dealing drugs from their mouth. You jump on them 

and if you're exhaling it's really hard to swallow, so they jump 

on them and squash their chests or something, and these 

people tend to cough out their crack. That is fraught with 

problems. So you've got big black men standing around and 

all of a sudden a whole load of white people jump on that 

black man! It looks awful. People are shouting "Police, stop 

what you're doing!" They think "My god the police are going 



68 

round in gangs beating up black people!" It doesn't look 

good but it has really good results.” 


It is worth mentioning in passing that there is concern amongst a few at 

the vivid contrast between the kind of police tactics used against crack 

users in the street (described in the quote above) and the more softysoftly 

approach taken with cocaine users in clubs. This contrast is said 

to be underpinned by class and race prejudice. 

“There is an immense amount of duplicity about who is 

targeted and who is not. If you are poorer and blacker you 

are far more likely to be targeted in the enforcement activity 

than if you are richer and whiter.” 


Crack markets are thought to thrive on good transport facilities, 

enabling both dealers and users to move quickly into an area. In Brent 

there has been use of specially trained dogs to identify drug carriers on 

the underground and there is hope that there will be more investment 

to develop this technique. 

“There is regular police activity, things like the passive dogs 

on the underground... Dogs that when people walk past with 

an illegal substance on them they will raise their paw and 

then the police can stop them... There are only 5 or 6 in the 

whole Metropolitan Police, and you can only work them for 

40 minutes at a time. Then they have to be taken for a walk 

and fed and watered. It’s a new thing.” 

DAT, Brent 

As already noted, dealers are believed to use abandoned cars as 

places to hide small stashes of crack. Action is being taken in all four 

boroughs to speed up removal of such cars and disrupt the workings of 

street dealers. In Brent a policy has been adopted to remove all 

abandoned cars within seven days. We do not know how successfully 

the policy has been implemented. 

Other actions have been taken in various localities, sometimes very 

expensively, to make the environment less hospitable to crack users. 

On the Mozart Estate in Westminster, for example, buildings and 

walkways have been modified to make it more difficult to move 

between high rise blocks, and to reduce the amount of publicly 

accessible space that is not overlooked. Throughout large parts of 

London efforts have been made to ‘design out’ drug use by: reducing 



69 

the number of recessed doorways; making stairwells less accessible; 

removing bushes and vegetation behind which people can hide to 

inject or defecate; improving lighting around estates, on passages and 

walkways. 

Notwithstanding a growing feeling on the part of the authorities that 

they are learning what they need to know about how crack is used and 

how dealers operate, there is on-going frustration that dealers continue 

to be on the streets and crack continues to be very readily available. 

The criminal justice system gets some of the blame for this frustration. 

Painstaking police work regularly fails to secure convictions or prison 

sentences. 

“They can’t nick the crack dealers because they keep the 

stuff in the house so they’ve never got enough. They don’t 

carry enough about to get a custodial sentence... I’ve met a 

lot of police who are very frustrated at seeing people they’ve 

been watching for a long time not getting a custodial 

sentence.” 


Not surprisingly, there is some demand for more severe sentencing to 

deter people from becoming dealers. 

“I think we should lock them (dealers) up for a long time... It 

is directly down to the fact that we are so soft on sentencing. 

We have a large prison population because it is a revolving 

door... People have seen⎯’Oh, hello, he is getting £15 grand 

and he only got 14 months inside. That is not a sentence at 

all. Good behaviour, two years if he is lucky, he will be out... 

You have got to make the punishment fit the crime. Because 

of the financial rewards, it has to be something quite drastic.” 


There is also interest in Anti Social Behaviour Orders (ASBOs) as a 

more effective alternative to injunctions, or trying to secure convictions 

for dealing. As already noted, Camden in particular has sought to use 

ASBOs to get both users and dealers off the streets of the borough. 

The use of ASBOs is credited with having greatly reduced the scale of 

the crack problem around Kings Cross. That much less progress has 

been made in Camden Town is attributed to there having only been 

two ASBO applications there. 

A difficulty identified by some is that people subject to ASBOs migrate 

to adjacent boroughs and the authorities may appear to be playing a 



70 

game of ‘bash the frog’⎯each knocking ‘undesirables’ back down as 

they pop up in their borough. 

“You’re never going to get rid of it in the borough. All you 

would do is displace it... What’s been happening recently is 

that we have been getting calls from boroughs like Croydon 

and Westminster and other boroughs saying that they are 

starting to get our people turning up in their boroughs.” 


“Our council areas are relatively small and they abut one 

another. So we've got guys from Camden who've been 

barred from Camden because they’re prolific drug dealers. 

Guess where they go? They come here. Camden were one 

of the first councils to use it and they barred people from 

Camden and we were like⎯’where are all these bad guys 

coming from?’... Now if Camden are looking for an anti social 

order they talk to us and we say⎯’thank you very 

much’⎯because Camden can do all the work and we can 

say⎯’can we have him banned from Westminster as 

well?’...They still go somewhere else. So to me it's not a 

solution, it's a Band Aid.” 


However, Camden strongly believes in ASBOs and says it is now 

possible to make them apply in more than one borough. Indeed, a 

person can be judicially barred from behaving in specified anti-social 

ways everywhere in the UK. 

“A typical Kings Cross ASBO wouldn’t just ban someone 

from Kings Cross. The excluding area would be the southern 

half of Camden... We include a bit of Islington, because we 

don’t want them going across the border... and a massive 

chunk of Westminster, so we do ASBOs that cover the West 

End.” 


ASBOs, it is argued are better than injunctions because when an 

injunction is breached, there has then to be a court hearing. With an 

ASBO, breach is followed rapidly by a court appearance for 

sentencing. ASBOs are slower to obtain in the first place... 

“They’re identified and they’re referred to (drugs) services 

and we normally give them four weeks for the services to 

kick in... If the services don’t work or aren’t accessed... then 

we’d ask them to sign up to an anti-social behaviour group or 

give them a final warning, saying this is your last chance. As 

soon as they breach that... if they’re caught injecting in the 

street or soliciting or whatever, that’s it, we’d move... and the 

police would take probably a month to put the package 

together. We have a legal consultation between the police 

and Local Authority... That could take another month, six 

weeks maybe... and then we wait for a court date, maybe 



71 

four weeks later... Three or four months in all.” 

WHAT SORT OF SERVICES WOULD BE AVAILABLE TO THEM? 

“Immediate treatment and immediate housing, let’s say in a 

hostel.” 


But Camden believe they are a lot more effective. 

“Don’t forget, every Authority in England and Wales is 

covered by our ASBOs now... All this injunction nonsense, it 

really does get on my nerves because you could spend a 

little bit more effort, probably hardly any more effort at all, 

and get the ASBOs... The ASBO is the best thing since 

sliced bread... If you can clear up Kings Cross, you can clear 

up anywhere, and I think all local authorities and the police 

should be using them.” 


One difficulty with ASBOs is said to be their novelty and the fact that 

some magistrates do not really understand them. 

“Magistrates aren’t properly trained. They don’t have any 

training in ASBOs... They don’t think about protecting the 

witnesses... I contacted the Greater London Magistrates 

Association, got hold of their training schedule and there was 

nothing whatsoever about those points.” 


More visible policing, especially police on foot, is often recommended 

as effective in areas blighted by drug use. It is said to reduce crime, 

reassure the public generally, and help restore a sense of community. 

”The quality of life for communities affected by drug markets can be 

significantly improved by high-visibility community policing which, at the 

least, discourages open public drug dealing and drug use”. 25 

“There has been a clear change of feeling on the streets in 

the commercial centre of Brixton, which is backed up by 

statistics. Burglary and robbery I think is down by about 

50%. Gun crime was about 11 in February instead of 44 last 

July. The single thing that has made by far the biggest 

difference is the increased presence of police officers on the 

streets... That really gives the community a much better 

feeling.” 


Foot patrols are widely thought to have an effective deterrent effect on 

both users and dealers. One policeman interviewed believed that the 

numbers of policemen on the beat affected numbers of users seeking 

treatment⎯the threat of arrest increased motivation to stop using. 




72 

“The drugs workers used to say that the number of people 

who seek counselling and rehab is proportionate to the 

motivation and if you have no policemen on the streets 

frightening you thinking⎯’Oh my god! maybe I should get off 

it’⎯then hardly anyone seeks help. The threat of arrest is 

sufficient stimulation for some of these people to seek help. I 

am a firm believer in uniformed patrolling because of the 

reassurance and the deterrent effect. People say it's very 

expensive but it's not as expensive as doing covert secret 

stuff with videos and working all night and following people 

for 24 hours a day, which costs an awful lot of money.” 


This informant believed that foot patrols had been neglected because 

police feel there is pressure to find more innovative solutions. 

“It’s sometimes difficult for people who are seeking promotion 

to say that old fashioned policing with policemen walking the 

streets in uniform is the best way of policing, because that's 

not very creative. It's almost saying you're not capable of a 

new or better thought. So we've suffered as a police force 

from people having weird and wonderful ideas about 

policing... Visible policing is a strategy because it provides 

two things. it provides the reassurance and the deterrent, at 

the same time.” 


More visible policing helps deter some but of course not all users, and 

the conspicuousness of crack use on the street continues to upset the 

public. Nobody seems confident that there is any effective short term 

means of getting them off the streets. Arresting them seems now to be 

quite widely regarded as a waste of time. 

“The policemen chosen to work on (Project) Lilac 26 , who 

were incredibly hard workers and would go out there and 

arrest their grannies, some of them. At the end of it only one 

of nearly 30 officers said⎯’arresting users is the way 

forward’. All the others, John Bulldog, the sergeant in 

charge, said⎯’If you told me that I'd say this two years ago 

I'd think you were mad but I now believe that arresting users 

is a waste of time.’ Because for all the work that goes into it 

for the net result they get a small fine or, the highest they had 

for a user was a month in prison.” 


Reducing the conspicuousness of crack users on the streets is further 

frustrated by problems arising from their frequent homelessness. It is 

said that a recent well publicised court case has made hostel 

managers very wary about homeless people using drugs on the 

26 Project Lilac was a Targeted Policing Initiative (TPI) aimed at using environmental 

improvements to reduce drug-related crime. The speaker is referring to work in the Charing 

Cross area of Westminster. 



73 

premises. A consequence has allegedly been that drug users are now 

more likely to be ejected from hostels. 

“The ‘winter comfort case’ in Cambridge... where two of the 

workers were imprisoned for allowing drug dealing in the 

hostel... About 70% of hostel dwellers in Central London are 

injecting drug users. So, you’ve got to really keep your eyes 

open, you really don’t want them to do anything on the 

(hostel) premises... If they do, you throw them out... Yet what 

we’re desperately trying to do, government policy is 

desperately trying to do, is get all the rough sleepers off the 

streets, so you don’t really want to be throwing people out of 

the hostel. It’s a very, very difficult problem. It’s a massive 

problem.” 

DAT, Camden 

On a more positive and general theme, there is widespread confidence 

that the importance of co-operation between different local 

agencies⎯police, probation, housing, treatment, adjacent local 

authorities, etc⎯in dealing with crack is a lesson that has now been 

thoroughly learnt. 

“We never used to talk to one another and we would 

say⎯’We will deal with our problem by giving it to you.’ 

That's not very grown up. But we are all part of a big group 

and (Project) Lilac did that.” 


However, appreciating the need for partnership often falls short of 

achieving ‘joined up’ action. Difficulties and delays in securing the cooperation 

of other agencies reportedly continue to cause frustration. 

“We need better co-ordination. Information is not filtering through 

organisations, never mind reaching other agencies. You can report an 

immediate problem to police, but that does not mean that their 

colleagues will know about it the next day or even the next week. They 

complain about a lack of help but squander what they are given.” 27 

Everyone regards reducing the quantities of cocaine entering the 

country as a law enforcement problem⎯a matter for police and 

customs. There are occasional references from those dealing with 

crack to the need for more effective action against the large importers 

and distributors of cocaine... 

27 ‘Smith, Sara’ (a pseudonym): The Crack Den Next Door, article in The Guardian, 11 Mar 

2003 



74 

“(What we need is) effective work in the enforcement sphere 

against the people higher up the chain. I mean people who 

run criminal cartels, but I also mean banks. I think the 

cocaine market is massive and it’s the cocaine market which 

is feeding this whole problem.” 


As already noted, the official view is that most of the cocaine that 

comes into the country (and is used as crack) comes overland via 

Europe. It is not at all clear how this cocaine⎯ brought over by 

‘organised crime’⎯finds its way into the hands of street dealers from 

the Caribbean. It seems to be assumed by some of those working in 

this field that much of the cocaine that is turned into crack comes from 

Jamaica and is dealt by an inexhaustible supply of young male 

Jamaicans recently arrived in the country (who allegedly retard the 

judicial process and claim asylum on arrest on the grounds that they 

are homosexual and their lives will therefore be endangered if they 

return to Jamaica). There is a sense of frustration amongst some that 

so conspicuous a flow of dealers from one country cannot be stanched. 

“How is it these young Jamaicans can just keep coming into 

the country... They clearly haven’t got jobs... and they’re 

clearly not coming over for education or for a holiday... 

They’re getting paid to come over here to come into the 

drugs market. That’s why they come. It seems to me a lot 

more could be done... Local Authorities and Police can only 

do their best, but if drugs can get into this country this 

easily...” 


However few people interviewed for this study addressed the issue of 

what might be done to reduce the quantity of cocaine coming into the 

country. In part this is presumably because they feel big time cocaine 

smuggling is well outside their professional remit. It is perhaps 

noteworthy nevertheless that few seem to interrogate the assumption 

that there is nothing that can be done that is not being done to reduce 

crack use by identifying the big importers and thereby reducing 

supplies of cocaine. 

8.2 Limitations of enforcement; prevention 

Everyone regards crack (like heroin) as an intractable problem to which 

there is no easy solution. Several professionals referred to an 

atmosphere of defeatism surrounding the subject... 



75 

“There’s this mythology going round about the inability to 

deal with it.” 

DAT, Camden 

The problem of crack-related prostitution is often perceived as 

especially perplexing. The few prostitutes who are arrested, convicted 

and given prison sentences rarely benefit from prison detox or 

treatment because their sentences are so short. Many people believe 

that prostitutes are in particularly urgent need of treatment and support. 

There is little confidence that the problem is attracting the resources it 

needs, or is being well handled, currently. 

“I suppose we need more dedicated police resources, 

dedicated to working to reduce prostitution in such a way that 

they don’t do what they’ve been doing which is just walking 

up and down the streets talking to the prostitutes and 

everyone else comes out and gawps at them, then the police 

go away and the prostitutes just carry on doing their 

business.... They’ve got to do more support work with them, 

outreach work.” 


There is very widespread agreement that the problem with crack 

cannot be effectively tackled by law enforcement alone. Although it is 

believed that progress is being made in some areas, there is an even 

more widespread conviction that (as long as supplies of cocaine 

continue to enter the country) enforcement can only bring partial or 

temporary respite from the problems crack causes. Dealers who are 

arrested and convicted are replaced by other dealers. New crack 

houses emerge as established ones are closed. People regard it as 

clear that enforcement has to be accompanied by efforts in other 

directions. At a minimum these have to include: effective treatment for 

users; carefully tailored support for ex-users; and well-resourced 

initiatives to mitigate the social conditions that are conducive to crack 

use. “Any policies that reduce social exclusion will help to address the 

demand side of the market and will support stated policy aims both in 

terms of protecting vulnerable young people and in improving the 

quality of life for those already involved in problematic drug use.” 28 




76 

“Users need to be supported and helped... It is really 

crucial... that people understand that we can’t tolerate the 

kind of crime that comes with it, but that people shouldn’t 

necessarily be banged up – they should just be helped to get 

over their addiction.” 


“For a sustainable solution... you need to engage the people 

who are the customers of crack houses in treatment and help 

and support services which would get them out of their life of 

drug use... You have to take the customer base away... to 

have any long term impact... That requires... a lot of 

investment... But police enforcement on its own, without that 

other support... appears to have resulted in lots of people... 

just being moved around different areas... There’s lots of 

pushing of crack houses up and down the borough, as it 

were.” 


“Three years ago we had a long and very expensive 

operation, Operation Crackdown, where crack houses were 

raided all the time, all over London. It was a centrally led 

operation. I think the question now being asked is⎯what 

impact if any did that have on the problem of crack houses 

and crack use? I think the simple answer is⎯no, it didn’t 

have an impact... because a lot of the crack users didn’t have 

access to treatment. So they’d be arrested and if they 

weren’t imprisoned, or even if they were imprisoned, there 

wasn’t any treatment... So they would go back to the same 

mistakes and the same environments and continue their 

crack use. The feeling now is that we’ve got to join with 

other agencies, particularly treatment agencies, and ensure 

these people are treated.” 


Some of those close to the problem, including those working on 

community projects, believe that there is broad public support for 

initiatives aimed less at enforcement and more at supporting young 

people, including users. There is some feeling that authority 

concentrates on enforcement for short term political reasons, and 

neglects initiatives with potential to produce longer term, less 

immediately newsworthy, results. 

“We were doing this consultation, we talked to 100s and 

100s of people last November over 10 days... People are 

very clued up here and very aware that there needs to be 

sustainable solutions, and that we need to be looking not just 

at DTTOs or whatever but at housing and education and 

employment and provision for young people and more 

culturally appropriate workers and services. People are 

aware of that know that is necessary. They want more 

sustainable solutions. It’s about looking at the whole 

infrastructure and making some really fundamental social 

changes. I think it is quite unusual to have a community that 

has that wisdom and perspective and holistic view.” 




77 

“If we democratise the whole approach to drugs and involve 

local people and listen to what they say, and make our 

policies on the basis of what they say, then we are going to 

run headlong into conflict with what the politicians and the 

laws say. Because, certainly in this area, communities don’t 

support, broadly speaking, what the politicians and the law 

says about drugs. They think it’s highly contradictory and 

unjust, and also that there’s a lot of political capital being 

made very inappropriately... This very heavy enforcement-led 

strategy is about targeting people when it’s too late. Most of 

the time, you take to any community and they’ll say⎯’we 

want to do preventative work with young people; we want to 

support our young people, include them in our communities, 

given them opportunities, and this will solve the problem... 

But actually it’s all about quick wins and enforcement led 

solutions. So there’s a mismatch there.” 


In some areas, certainly in Lambeth, there appears to be a growing 

belief that sustainable improvement in the crack problem requires the 

involvement of the whole community and that initiatives that arise from 

members of the public have a better chance of success than those 

handed down by official bodies. The impetus to change things in 

Brixton is attributed by some to the public rather than the authorities. 

“The community wasn’t going to allow Brixton to become a 

ghetto. I think there was a real feeling that it was just being 

left, that there was a concentration of problems here, clearly 

a massive drugs market... It eventually led to the launch of 

Phase 1 of ‘No Room for Smack and Crack’.” 


“There is a real relevance for work that is community led... 

Community led stuff has a very crucial role to play... It can be 

far more creative and broad based and I think community 

organisations have a far better chance of engaging people 

who are excluded and disenfranchised... And that should be 

recognised through decent resources.” 


People involved with community initiatives unsurprisingly recommend 

more attention to ideas that the public put forward, better channels of 

communication, and better funding for the resulting initiatives. 

“I think that the community has an equally important role to 

play as the police and the council. I don’t think that a cure 

can be done to us. I think we have to actively participate, 

especially around something like crack... There needs to be 

better outreach. We need to talk to people in different ways 

and to consult differently.” 




78 

It may be worth noting in passing that the initiative in Lambeth on 

cannabis⎯letting it be known that cannabis users would not normally 

be arrested⎯is credited by some with producing significantly improved 

community-police relations and thereby greater co-operation between 

the public and the police on crack. 

“An analysis of what went on around the cannabis 

experiment was that all the people who smoked weed and 

maybe drank a bit too much, but otherwise were law abiding 

citizens, suddenly saw the police as an agency that they 

could have some dialogue with. That’s actually a big slice of 

people in Lambeth. So that improved relations between the 

police and that whole section of the community.” 


“One of the things that really helped that (the improvement in 

the feel of the streets) happen, oddly, was the cannabis 

pilot... because that really emphasised the fact that when we 

were looking at drugs we were looking at drug related crime 

and we didn’t want to place an emphasis on drugs that didn’t 

give rise to... crime... The cannabis experiment suddenly 

created really good bridges between the police and the 

community, and that has enabled a lot more work to 

happen.” 


Perhaps needless to say, not everyone agrees with this analysis. 

“The general community in Brixton are against all drugs. 

They were particularly dismayed with the attitude towards 

cannabis.” 


In addition to treatment and support for users, some people in the field 

see a need for improved education and training about drugs, including 

crack, especially among professionals working with young people. 

“You can become a professional in all sorts of key 

professions and never have any drug training in your life. 

You could be a teacher, a youth worker, a policeman, a 

nurse, a doctor, probation officer. It’s not part of the core 

training. Now why on earth not? Why not? It’s a massive 

problem... It’s unforgivable that teachers don’t know enough 

about it to be teaching about it... There is a terrible lack of 

confidence in dealing with drug issues which doesn’t need to 

be there.” 

DAT, Camden 

More specifically, there appears to be a widespread suspicion that 

many people working in law enforcement, probation, education, 

primary health care, social services and even in drugs treatment do not 



79 

have a good enough understanding of the effects of crack and typical 

patterns of use. 

There is a feeling in some quarters that authority makes too clear a 

distinction between young people who have taken drugs and others 

living in similar circumstances who have not but may well in the future. 

Professionals in social services, especially those working with young 

people, are thought by some to need a more imaginative and positive 

approach to educating vulnerable young people about drugs. 

“Young people vulnerable to developing problem drug use... 

they’re the same old suspects really⎯young offenders, 

people in care, people excluded or truanting from school, 

homeless... Basically what the young offender team do is 

say⎯’do you use drugs, if you do we’ll refer you to the young 

peoples’ drug treatment agency, if you don’t, we don’t do 

anything with you’. Now I’m working with that, and we’ve got 

to do something. You can’t not do anything... It’s like wading 

through treacle, but we’ll get there... You don’t come at it 

from an anti-drugs angle, you come at it from an increase 

your health angle... You know, have a personal trainer, David 

Beckham has a personal trainer, Madonna has a personal 

trainer. Drink a bit of fresh juice and⎯‘Oh, you take a few 

drugs, let’s do a bit of work on that as well’. That’s the sort of 

work that it would be good for the YOT to be doing. General 

sort of health stuff and you might then come across the drug 

stuff and work on it in a way that was meaningful to a young 

person, rather than⎯’don’t do crack, it’s really bad for you’. 

But to pull crack out of all that, when they’re not even 

interested in doing anything around drugs, is not possible. I 

mean, a lot of these people that we see as vulnerable aren’t 

even using drugs yet.” 

DAT, Camden 

Some professionals take the view that it is wrong to concentrate 

particularly on crack. They see dependent drug use as arising from 

social conditions⎯poverty, lack of opportunity, unwanted children, 

dysfunctional families⎯and believe it is these underlying causes that 

need to be addressed with more vigour. 

“What would I do? I’d do parenting classes in schools for a 

start.” 


Another underlying cause is sometimes identified as the acceptability 

of cocaine as a recreational drug. 



80 

“It’s an accepted thing to go to a party or a pub or a club and 

there’s going to be someone who is going to be able to 

provide cocaine. It’s almost a standard feature of going out. 

That kind of acceptance that this is just normal behaviour 

would need to change.” 


There is a quite widespread view that the crack problem will not be 

successfully rolled back without radical new thinking. Some are struck 

by the tension between the two core features of the problem ⎯crack 

users cause misery, crack users need help⎯and wonder if it is right to 

rely so heavily on the police. Perhaps some drug-specific resource 

needs to be created that could be more proactive in contacting drug 

users and responsible for both enforcement and treatment. There 

seems, to some people, to be something unsatisfactory about current 

arrangements. 

“Is it appropriate that we’re using police to deal with the 

problem in the first place?.. The police don’t want to deal with 

this... Is there some better way?” 


The provision of safe injecting centres is one of the suggestions made. 

It is argued that such provision is the only way numbers of crack (and 

heroin) users who cause offence by injecting in public, and scatter 

paraphernalia, can be significantly reduced. 

“Our most common complaint from the public is people 

injecting in public... We would like clean injecting rooms but 

they’ve gone absolutely bonkers about it, absolutely 

bonkers.” 

DAT, Camden 

“I truly believe that until there is a lawful place to go and take 

your drugs off the streets then there will always people taking 

drugs on the street or in squats or crack houses or 

whatever... A couple of years ago the government started to 

say that if you are building a night club you should have a 

chill out zone for people who've taken ecstasy to come down 

and have water and have qualified first aiders available. This 

was talked about a couple of years back and I was amazed 

because to me it was a step in the right direction. It 

acknowledges that people take drugs. At the moment they're 

forced to do it in seedy places. I feel that until they bite the 

bullet and say⎯’we will have what the press call shooting 

galleries for people to go and take their drugs in a safe 

environment where they can get clean works and there are 

drug workers saying , have a 

joined up service and have advisors and people even saying 

.’ 

Until you do that there is always going to be a problem either 



81 

on the streets or in crack houses. We use legislation at the 

moment but what we do is displace.” 


Some people advocate the return of heroin on prescription, arguing 

that this would enable the authorities to concentrate on crack. 

“I would like to see Heroine put back on prescription, get it off 

the streets and then if you didn’t have that to worry about you 

could concentrate on the crack.” 


Camden DAT, in light of its difficulties closing markets in the borough, 

recommends consideration of ‘the decriminalisation of recreational 

drugs’ and concentrating all enforcement resources on dealing with 

heroin and crack. “Given the failure over several years, and across 

numerous agencies and countries, to have any significant effect on the 

supply side of the drug market, we feel it is time to consider seriously 

the option of undercutting the illicit market with a regulated legal 

market.” 29 However Camden acknowledges that the UK’s freedom of 

action to decriminalise unilaterally is limited and believes that, short of 

decriminalisation, the NHS should prescribe injectable drugs and users 

provided with injecting rooms. 

8.3 The US experience 

It is widely believed that the crack problem has receded in the US and 

although nobody who was interviewed appeared to have studied the 

US experience closely, a few points may be worth making. 

It is assumed by many that vigorous enforcement of the law, and stiff 

sentences, have been major factors in the US. The much higher 

incidence of workplace drug testing than in the UK is also thought to be 

significant. 

“They lock a lot of people up... Things like work place testing 

must have had an impact on people in the cities.” 





82 

The number and stature of crack casualties is said by some to have 

given crack a pariah status and reduced its appeal. 

“A few high-profile personalities died... Eventually a lot of 

people sort of got into trouble with it and came out 

saying⎯’don’t get into this, it ruined me’⎯and that really 

helped.” 

DAT, Camden 

Another school of thought is that a resurgence in heroin has been 

chiefly responsible for the reduction in crack use. Drug use of course 

responds to fashion and to shifts in pricing. 

“They had a big rash of problems with crack, then heroin 

seemed to take over again and that seemed to really reduce 

the problems they were seeing with crack.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

Religion is thought by some to have played a part. A significant 

percentage of people successfully coming off crack are said to have 

been ‘born again’ as Christians. This would accord with the widely 

agreed need for ‘treatment’ that is holistic in the broadest sense of the 

term. 

It is perhaps surprisingly that the US experience, and the apparent 

reduction in crack use there, seems not to have been carefully studied. 

9. Treatment 

9.1 Impediments to seeking or getting treatment 

It is widely believed that crack users are deterred from seeking 

treatment for a crack habit because they do not think there is any 

treatment, or cannot conceive of treatment that would be effective. 

For heroin users, treatment is conceptually much clearer. If you want 

to come off heroin, you know you will feel ill if you stop using. You 

know that methadone and other drugs are available as substitutes to 

reduce or mitigate the symptoms of illness. Because you know you will 

be ill if you do not take heroin or a substitute, you are likely to be 

acutely conscious of your dependence. You will be consciously looking 

for help in overcoming this dependency, even if only for a while. 



83 

The nature of crack addiction is of course different. Crack users do not 

feel physically ill if they stop using regularly (though they may 

experience strong cravings). They do not have as acute a sense of 

dependence and are less focussed on help to overcome dependence. 

A substitute drug to stave off feelings of illness is not required in the 

same way with crack as with heroin. Drug services are therefore liable 

to be perceived as having less of direct or immediate relevance to 

offer. With heroin users, prescribing methadone is perceived as 

treatment; the absence of a substitute drug for crack encourages the 

perception that there is no treatment. Another way of putting this might 

be to say that crack users have to change their ideas and their lives, 

rather than just exchange a street drug for a prescribed one. Clearly 

this represents a different order of difficulty. 

“This is a real problem⎯’you can’t treat crack users because 

there’s no substitute’... Methadone is not treatment anyhow... 

They’re actually seeking more help than just a substitute.” 


People who use both heroin and crack usually present as heroin users, 

even if they are spending significantly more money on crack. This is 

presumed to be, at least in part, because they think of drugs services 

as ‘for’ heroin users. 

“We’re not engaging people who might see themselves as 

primarily crack users... They don’t come forward for 

treatment. They don’t see any particular benefits in going for 

treatment.” 


Many polydrug users who have accessed services looking for help with 

heroin addiction go on to be helped with their crack use. Needle 

exchanges are seen as a valuable interface with crack users, supplying 

an opportunity to open a dialogue with them about treatment. One of 

the frustrations of the Hungerford Project in Westminster is that their 

needle exchange is sited in a van and the lack of facilities greatly 

reduces the scope of the dialogue. 

“The needle exchange is a really good way of pulling people 

into services. They sit down for a bit and it’s⎯’hi! you know 

that’s a nasty abscess, why don’t I dress that for you?’⎯and 

then you gradually pull people in. To get them to look at 

reducing their crack use you need to entice them into 

working with you... But we’re completely not allowed to 

develop a fixed site needle exchange because everybody is 



84 

so angry... I can understand why people wouldn’t want a 

needle exchange next door to where they live. I do 

understand that, but I think there’s a sort of added level of 

anger about it that’s a bit irrational somewhere.” 

DAT, Camden 

Many crack users are referred to services through the criminal justice 

system. 

“People get into problems with crack very quickly, but also 

they get into problems through the criminal justice system... 

The majority of people we’re seeing will come through the 

arrest referral scheme.” 

DAT, Brent 

Some services report that the word is getting around on the street and 

people who regard crack as their primary drug, and their primary 

problem, are beginning to attend services. 

“For the first time we are starting to see people who are 

reporting crack as their primary drug use, particularly from 

the African-Caribbean community... Crack users will access 

services if they think there is a crack specific service. So 

what Addaction have found is that the people who have 

started to trickle in have started to tell other people about the 

services Addaction offers. Which is the best way from drugs 

services to build up their credibility.” 

DAT, Brent 

It is widely acknowledged that, depending to some extent on where 

they live, crack users may not be entirely wrong in assuming that drugs 

services have little or nothing to offer them. It is generally agreed that 

treatment for crack users is evolving; not all services have successfully 

accommodated the new and different demands it makes on them. 

“Everyone’s trying to think of a way of working with crack and 

I think we really need to study what the clients need, rather 

than trying to apply an old kind of service to a very new, 

different type of drug use... The services are just playing 

catch-up, so to speak.” 


“It is quite difficult for traditional drug treatment agencies, 

which are very opiate based, to set up crack-specific projects 

because it’s very different... What happens is they set up a 

day programme and they have to modify it along the way and 

realise that they’ve got to be a lot more flexible and that you 

can’t sort of demand a ten till four programme and consistent 

attendance.” 

DAT, Camden 



85 

9.2 What is treatment? 

As noted, many services are experimenting with different ways of 

helping crack users. Some services have modest ambitions and are 

intended to initiate contact and develop trust in the hope that users will 

return when/if they are clearer about wanting to do something about 

their drug use. 

“We need the drop in as the first point of call. People build a 

relationship with the workers in the drop in, and then they 

come for their own sessions.” 


First contacts may develop into a number of essentially diversionary 

therapies intended to develop trust, restore confidence and self-worth, 

and prepare users for regimes requiring greater commitment. 

“We’ve got a low threshold, low pressure programme offering 

confidential therapy, groups, counselling, a whole range of 

diversionary tactics, basically... We do t-shirt design, filming, 

literacy, music technology... It’s low pressure because if you 

expect people to come form nine to five for five days a week, 

they don’t, they crash out... Minimum that they do need to 

come is twice a week, to see their key worker... Living in 

rehab is a nightmare when you’re not ready for it. We found 

that a lot of people we worked with weren’t ready for things 

like detox, or going into rehab. So what we try and do is 

either get them into a position when they are ready... 

Everything is about allowing people to be ready to move onto 

the next stage. 


Our understanding of what is available across London and elsewhere 

is not complete, but clearly other services are more ambitious. They 

are often tailored to a client’s circumstances and/or to the stage he/she 

is at in their relationship with the drug. 

“I have two programmes – six weeks and twelve weeks. The 

six weeks is for chaotic drug users looking to go into rehab. I 

do preparation for the more in-depth work. The twelve is if 

they’re less chaotic. They might be working, with family, and 

going into rehab is not an option.” 


Much of the help offered to crack users is described as ‘complementary 

therapy’. Cognitive Behaviour Therapy seems to be quite widely 

regarded as useful. “Cognitive Behaviour therapies are particularly 

effective, as the client learns how to identify and avoid triggers that 



86 

lead to relapse. This service can be provided very effectively in both 

community and residential settings.” 30 The degree to which treatment 

is helpful appears to depend heavily on the quality of the relationships 

established between clients and service providers. 

“Complementary therapies⎯shiatsu, acupuncture, 

reflexology⎯some structured counselling, also some care 

planning so they can be referred to social services for 

residential and structured day care as appropriate. What 

we’re looking at for this year’s treatment plan is making much 

more use of structured day care.” 

DAT, Brent 

“They’re experimenting... Mainly it’s around complementary 

therapies and counselling, especially CBT type counselling, 

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. A lot of it is you motivating the 

client. It’s really about your persona and knowledge in 

helping that client recognise what’s happening within 

themselves... There’s no substitute out there, so it’s really 

around changing behaviour⎯not seeing the people you used 

to see, not going to the places you used to go... Coming and 

talking to someone about how you’re feeling, what your 

cravings are... We saw a guy in Hackney whose most 

stressful day was when his giro came, because he knew he 

was going to blow it⎯saying, ‘come and have some 

acupuncture in the morning, calm down, relax a bit’. We’re 

trying to break behavioural patterns.” 


There has been a certain amount of learning about how ‘psycho-social’ 

treatment is best delivered, although clearly much depends on what 

suits an individual client and what an individual drugs worker is most 

comfortable doing. “Quality of client counsellor relationship highly 

influential (empathetic, knows about crack, builds relationship, non 

judgmental, honest)... Next day appointments better than same day or 

four days later appointments. Auricular acupuncture may help retain... 

Structured counselling as good as Cognitive Behaviour Therapy.” 31 

Getting people off crack is agreed to be very different to getting people 

off heroin, and crack is thought of as throwing up new and different 

challenges. These perceptions tend to encourage the notion that new 

and different services are needed to deal with crack users. A counterargument 

is that so many crack users are polydrug users; many use 

heroin and many also have alcohol dependency problems, of which 

they are sometimes unaware. 

30 NTA press release, 20 Mar2003 

31 Annette Dale-Perera, Director of Quality, NTA, quoted in Your Community, Your Problem. 



87 

“If you get into setting up separate centres for crack users 

and opiate users, what do you do about all the people who 

use both? Do they have to go to both services?... We also 

find that crack users are looking for something else to help 

with the comedown. But most often that’s alcohol. We find 

that people do have a dependency on alcohol that they 

weren’t aware that they had.” 


Many people working in drugs services emphasise the need for a 

holistic approach to the needs of all drug users and perhaps 

particularly those of crack users. If people are to be successful in 

coming off heroin or crack, they have to arrive at a degree of 

confidence that they can cope without these drugs and that life will be 

better without them. Helping people achieve this sort of confidence 

depends on paying a lot of attention to the individual as an individual, 

not just someone affected by drug abuse. 

“I don’t think we need to re-invent services or set up loads of 

services specific to crack users. We’re talking about working 

with individuals who have a substance misuse problem... 

Basically we’re not just treating someone’s crack use... Crack 

use, or heroin use, or whatever, is a way of dealing with 

problems that people already have.... We have some 

different interventions here... But ultimately we are assessing 

individual need and assessing problems in regard to 

substance misuse and in regard to social situation and what 

sort of support this person needs. What, very often, gets 

missed, when you talk about crack use, is that we talk a lot 

about the drug, but we don’t talk about the individual.” 


Success depends on many different elements; there is no one key 

intervention. Effective treatment is said to involve creation of a 

structured framework and then paying attention to: relapse prevention; 

trigger management; managing emotions; cognitive behavioural 

techniques; anxiety management, external support systems and 

aftercare. It is important to “achieve standards that include and foster 

an individual’s commitment to be involved”. 32 

Addressing a user’s practical needs, especially in relation to housing, is 

very widely seen as vital to successful outcomes. Crack users 

attempting to stop using are regarded as much more likely to relapse if 

they do not have secure housing and, in many cases, if they are unable 

to leave the vicinity where they used crack. It is said to be predictably 

32 See Grantley Haynes, Crack Outreach Team Manager, Northern Birmingham Mental 

Health NHS Trust, quoted in Your Community, Your Problem. 



88 

disastrous if people who have successfully stopped using have to 

return to premises where there are people who continue to use. There 

is a need to look comprehensively at the structure of a client’s 

circumstances and give practical support. 

“With a crack user, we might find, you know, you’ve been out 

of work for a year. you’re having problems re-establishing 

contact with your family, because of your crack use. Maybe 

what would be helpful for you would be to get some secure 

housing in the community and go somewhere like Milton 

skills centre, where you can re-establish skills which you 

previously had, get back into employment, and then look at 

getting back in touch with your family.” 


“Coming off drugs actually is a piece of piss relatively... 

Staying off is the hard bit. That’s the bit we really need to 

concentrate on, the follow up work. What used to happen is 

they get housed back into their own flat, in the middle of a 

serious crack estate, and they get maybe a support worker 

who sees them once a month or something. That’s where 

we need to be concentrating a lot of our effort. That’s the 

other thing we’re doing, is work with people coming out of 

prison, which we didn't used to do before. Actually having 

prison gate services that people who are released from 

Brixton then have a worker who takes them to the housing.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

There is some use of drugs as an element in treatment for crack users. 

“We do use promazine, which is an anti-psychotic drug, and 

we use it in tiny amounts, very small amounts. But not all 

people will require it. What it can do, if people are having 

quite extreme moods, or really struggling with their crack 

withdrawals, the promazine can just take the edge off it.” 


And there are those who think that drugs may ultimately play a larger 

role than at present. “There is emerging evidence to support use of 

anti-depressants to manage depressive episodes for those with 

psychiatric complications.” 33 

“I still think there are some pharmacological interventions we 

haven’t tried and that needs to be researched more 

fully⎯any pharmacological intervention that can assist in 

coping with the comedown of that binge.” 


But others think that the search for a ‘medical’ solution is mistaken. 

33 Your Community, Your Problem 



89 

“We are still hanging onto a medical model of intervention, 

that somehow we’ve got to have a medicalised therapeutic 

technique which might help with this. But I think that’s a 

mistake.” 


9.3 What are crack users up against in trying to stop using? 

As noted, regular users of crack who stop using do not experience 

symptoms of illness in the way that regular users of heroin do. Crack is 

said to be ‘psychologically’ addictive. People have differing views on 

the nature and intensity of this addiction. It almost certainly varies 

significantly from one user to another. Some users are said to 

experience cravings to use even after prolonged periods of non-use. It 

is the strength, predictability and persistence of these cravings that 

account for crack’s reputation for being highly addictive. 

“I hear really contradictory things about the nature of craving 

and the kind of crack hangover that you will get after 

bingeing because of increased levels of adrenaline and 

dopamine... You have huge anxiety attacks and sort of sense 

paranoia and that’s why people feel they need to go back to 

crack use, to compensate against that.” 


“The drug works in a very funny way. You could be in prison 

for a couple of years without wanting it, but as soon as you 

step out, you start craving it again.” 


“I don’t think we know much about the chemical nature of 

cravings.” 


A major problem crack users face in attempting to stop using is that 

cravings to use crack are liable to be triggered by any number of 

associations⎯people, places, paraphernalia, etc. These triggers are 

difficult to avoid, especially if you have no money and no job and your 

choices in terms of where you live and what you do are limited. Many 

users apparently say that there is little chance of their being able to 

stop using unless they can move to a different locality. 

“A user in crisis will say⎯’put me in a helicopter and take me 

out of here; that’s the only way you’ll break the cycle I’m 

trapped in’.” 


The probability of a former user being able to resist cravings to re-use 

will usually depend to a significant extent on what else is happening in 



90 

their lives. There will be exceptions to this pattern, but, broadly, the 

more positive their circumstances and their prospects, the more robust 

their resistance to cravings is likely to be. The problem for services, of 

course, is that they can have only a limited influence on the outcomes 

down the line that matter⎯relationships, housing, employment. This 

need for on-going support is well recognised. “We... need to develop 

that range of supporting employment and accommodation that is 

essentially part of dealing with crack dependency.” 34 “It is essential to 

develop ways to support reintegration into the community.” 35 “There 

should be a greater emphasis on a holistic and co-ordinated approach 

to treatment, from counselling through to aftercare, housing, education 

and employment” 36 . 

In attempting to build self confidence and self-worth, long term crack 

users may face the same sort of daunting difficulties faced by heroin 

addicts⎯they have to come to terms with the lives they have led, very 

often including sustained criminality. ‘Recovery’, or successful 

treatment, for many crack users, as for heroin users, may be a very 

long haul. 

“If somebody comes and knocks on this door, then they’ve 

thought about it for a long time. It’s taken them a lot of 

courage. They come in here and want some help. First and 

foremost, I’ve got to deal with my drug dependency. Let’s 

say it’s going to be a success and they’re totally committed to 

seeing it through. It might be one, two years before they can 

say with any degree of certainty⎯’I won’t go back to that’. 

Then, when they’re no longer using, what do they do with 

their time? ‘I never finished school, I’m half illiterate, I 

haven’t got a single qualification’. So they might have to go 

back to education. And then⎯’how am I going to live, to pay 

for it all? If I’m going to do this and be successful, I need to 

have a home and I need to be gainfully employed, I don’t 

want to be ripped off’. When governments ask people to give 

up drugs, it’s not like giving up cigarettes. It means massive 

changes to their lives, and what is required is a network of 

support, from housing to health to drugs counselling to 

education to training to employment. You could be looking at 

a package of seven or eight years until someone can 

say⎯’I’m working, I’m happy with my wage, I’m in a 

relationship, I’m contributing through taxes, I feel good about 

myself’.” 


34 Bob Ainsworth, Your Community, Your Problem. Crack Cocaine Conference, Birmingham, 

24-25 June 2002, Conference Report 

35 Harocopos, Alex et al: On the Rocks: A Follow-up Study of Crack users in London, Mar 

2003 

36 NTA, quoted in RBKC, Cabinet meeting, 3 rd Oct 2002 



91 

“They start to realise⎯’God I was an evil bastard! I’ve done 

some disgraceful things in my time. I hate myself’. How do 

you deal with that stuff? Can this person actually come to 

terms with what he’s done in his life? Can be actually like 

himself? It’s complex... So you’ve got to support people all 

the way.” 


On the other hand, some crack users have brief but vivid using 

histories. The time scale for the descent into chaotic use can be much 

shorter than is typically the case for heroin users. This may make 

recovery easier for users whose primary drug is crack. 

“People get to the stage of crisis much quicker in the case of 

crack use, but what that also means is that people still have 

better links back into ‘normal society’ in a way. They’re not 

so long-term unemployed. They probably have better ideas 

about managing their health, car, bills etc. A lot of people 

have had all of that. They’ve lost it all, but they have an 

awareness of the kind of lifestyle they want to get back to.” 


Maintaining treatment, or even keeping in touch with drugs services, 

tends to be more problematic with crack than heroin users. As noted, 

there is a greater conceptual clarity with most heroin treatment⎯having 

the methadone enables you to stop taking heroin; you attend treatment 

to maintain your supply of heroin. Of course many heroin users hate 

methadone and are deeply dissatisfied with this regime, but they are 

clear about the path they are on. This is less likely to be case with 

crack treatment, relying to a significant extent, as it does, on 

diversionary activities and building trust. Moreover, crack users who 

are still using are more likely to have chaotic lifestyles than are heroin 

users. They often find it difficult to commit to treatment and engage 

with it. 

“Opiate users, to a degree, need their scrip. It is a bit like 

Pavlov’s dog. You can motivate them to come on certain 

days to do the things they’ve got to do to get their scrip. 

Crack users generally tend to be more on the chaotic 

side⎯you’ll say come on Thursday at 3 and they’ll come on 

Friday at 5 when you’re just leaving, and it’s like⎯’but I’m 

here now, just help me out now’. And because of the 

withdrawals and the massive mood swings, and the ups and 

downs and highs of the drug make them much harder to 

engage and their behaviour is a lot more extreme.” 


Crack produces the effects users appreciate by releasing dopamine 

and serotonin. The unhappiness of the comedown, and some of the 



92 

psychological distress users experience, is the result of the body 

adapting to these interventions. 

“It’s quite simple in terms of what crack does: it releases 

dopamine and serotonin into the body. And after long use, 

the body can’t take them back into the brain. When you stop 

the body is replenishing those chemicals into the body... 

People never get the same effect from crack as they do the 

first time unless they only use once every two years... We 

often get people who say I thought I was going mad, or I 

thought I’d caused irreversible damage, and stopping it I’m 

not the same person as I used to be. People get scared that 

they’ve changed forever, when actually it’s just about your 

body stabilising.” 


One problem for treatment agencies is that crack users may not 

attribute the way they are feeling to the after-effects of crack. 

“Users themselves tell us there aren’t crack withdrawal 

symptoms. They aren’t aware of the problems they might 

encounter when they stop using crack. We do a lot of work 

explaining to people why they are feeling the way they do, 

behaving the way they do, with mood swings and such, while 

they’re here... There is not enough understanding amongst 

users that there are difficulties that they will encounter when 

they try to stop.” 


Feeling miserable and anxious without appreciating the contribution 

that having used crack is making to these feelings of course erodes 

commitment and increases the danger of relapse. 

“When people are feeling low, they’re not understanding 

what is going wrong with them. They only way they know to 

make themselves feel better is to go and use. People do get 

to a point where they’re so frustrated about feeling the way 

they are feeling that they feel they just need to go and use.” 


As already noted, there is some uncertainty about the degree to which 

crack use may give rise to serious or prolonged mental illness. There 

is apparently some evidence that it may, at least to a level that 

exacerbates the difficulties of treatment. “Psychiatric problems can 

occur with psychostimulant use, especially with chronic use and during 

‘binges’... Neuro-psychological tests on chronic psychostimulant users 

show cognitive impairments, some of which may be persistent, that 



93 

may adversely affect the ability to make decisions and thus the 

outcome of treatment.” 37 

A difficulty of a different sort, and one more likely to confront crack than 

heroin users, is debt. Because the effects are brief and use is so 

compulsive, people who take crack will often attempt to get supplies on 

credit. A proportion have dealers looking for them and are afraid. 

“There’s been quite a lot of stuff written about safe houses, 

and because of the mess that people get into, they end up 

owing an awful lot of money... and often have dealers looking 

for them... It’s always something that people who are running 

crack projects say that they want... Somewhere people can 

just get away from the scene for two or three days. They 

crash part of it and then they can be sort of more engaged in 

the more run of the mill treatment then.” 

DAT, Camden 

“With crack users we often find that their dealers are 

threatening to kill them. We have a lot of people who are 

suicidal.” 


9.4 How much confidence is there in treatment? 

The National Treatment Outcome Research Study has estimated that 

“for every additional £1 spent on drug misuse treatment, £3 is saved on 

the cost of criminal behaviour”. 38 There are no estimates specific to 

crack but much of the documentation from official sources is cautiously 

optimistic that people are being effectively helped to stop using crack. 

“Rather than nothing working, it is more that many well-managed 

approaches work well.” 39 

“According to the National Treatment Outcomes Research Study, 

2002, four to five years after entering treatment, over half those using 

crack at intake were no longer doing so. Return to crack misuse over 

the five years was minimal, an important indication that the benefits of 

treatment are usually not reversed once treatment ends.” The same 

NTA press release notes, a little further down: “in terms of recovery, 

crack/cocaine users can appear to have made a complete recovery (ie 

37 Scottish Executive, Scottish Advisory Committee on Drug Misuse, Psychostimulant 

Working Group Report, June 2002 

38 Quoted in Royal Borough Review of Substance Use Services: Purpose and Scoping 

Report. 




94 

stop using it altogether quickly) but be susceptible to lapses/relapses 

very quickly.” 40 Crack users who enter treatment very often relapse in 

the short term. In the more positive longer term figures, it is perhaps 

difficult to know what treatment itself contributes, relative to other 

developments in life. Everyone agrees that measuring the success of 

treatments for crack is not straightforward. 

“Measuring success of people coming in for treatment for 

crack is pretty difficult compared to measuring success for 

opiate users. If somebody is on methadone and being 

stabilised, that’s seen as a success, if they’re getting detox 

and going to rehab. With crack, it’s not really measurable, so 

you are seen to be throwing money at an everlasting problem 

and wasting money as such.” 


A follow-up study of a cohort of crack users attending residential, 

abstention-based treatment at City Roads Crisis Intervention records 

that, of 94 crack users who had ‘had treatment’, 5 were abstainers (no 

drugs except cannabis or alcohol for the life of the study) after 18 

months, 22 were lapsers (had used crack or cocaine after at least 6 

months abstention but not returned to regular use), 18 relapsers (had 

periods of abstinence of at least three months but had returned to 

regular use), 33 were users (had used crack during at least 12 of the 

18 months of the study). 41 

The triggers to relapse identified in this study were (in apparent order): 

negative emotional states, including boredom and depression; contact 

with people associated with earlier drug use; having money; seeing 

drug-using paraphernalia; particular places associated with drug use; 

alcohol. A larger proportion of women than men in the study relapsed. 

Looking at the views of those interviewed for this study, there appears 

to be some tension between the certainty many feel that crack cannot 

be defeated by law enforcement alone⎯users need help and support 

to give up⎯and uncertainties about how effectively help can be 

delivered. 

“The sort of crisis detox places we use (one of them City 

Roads) have got very good returns on crack users.” 

DAT, Lambeth 

40 ibid 

41 Harocopos, Alex; et al 



95 

HOW MUCH CONFIDENCE HAVE YOU GOT IN TREATMENT? 

“Huge... I think you have to have faith in treatment don’t you 

because otherwise you despair... No, I have, I have... We do 

have really, really good services in London which are very 

expert at working with people’s crack use... Like City Roads, 

like The Blenheim Project.” 


HOW MUCH CONFIDENCE IS THERE IN TREATMENT? 

“Mixed. There’s a school of thought that you can’t treat crack 

users, or there is very little effective treatment available, and 

that the only answer is to lock them up... We know the 

residential treatments are more effective. If you can get 

crack users into residential treatment there’s a good chance 

of weaning them off... The crucial thing is getting these 

people into treatment in the first place. Enforcement alone 

isn’t the answer.” 


There is agreement that treatment stands no chance of success unless 

a user really wants to stop using. Some informants take the view that 

not everyone who presents for treatment wants to stop; drugs fill a 

vacuum in their lives they could not readily fill otherwise. 

“The ones that are prepared to give up are (easy) to work 

with. The problem is the people who don’t want to give up... 

A lot of them don’t want to stop. They think⎯’what would I 

do without drug use?’ I’m talking about people who’ve been 

using drugs for ten years each day of their lives. What are 

they going to do? You put them in a flat in Tower Hamlets, 

two months later it’s a crack house.” 


There is some scepticism about the effectiveness of treatment for any 

long term drug user, not just a crack user. 

“I am a cynic with rehabilitation. Generally. I ask people time 

and time again, give me some really good examples where 

you have taken a person who was absolutely hooked on 

drugs and now they have rehabilitated and are contributing 

towards life in the community. People can’t do it. People 

naturally progress out of it or they die.” 


As already noted, with crack, the crux seems to be practical help and 

support as much as what might be more narrowly thought of as 

treatment. At the Your Community, Your Problem conference, a 

workshop concluded that “supported housing is essential for crack 

users”, and that “there is a need for... safe and secure housing at short 

notice... refuges”. 



96 

“Whether structured, talking therapy-type interventions on 

their own will have an effect, I’m quite dubious... In broad 

terms, I think keep people busy, do things that are useful to 

them. Address all the social issues that are there, and, really 

importantly, grab people when you’ve got a chance and 

you’ve got a bit of motivation and provide a very quick 

responsive, high support package of care for those people... 

The first thing is to engage this sort of person and in order to 

engage them we’ve got to be useful to them... A lot of time 

the support needs to be housing. I think the full stop to a lot 

of these cycles (in and out of treatment) is housing.” 


9.5 How might treatment be improved? 

Not many people have specific recommendations to make for 

improving the effectiveness of crack treatment. There is widely agreed 

to be a problem attracting primary users to make initial contact with 

services and maintain it. Belief that there can be no real treatment 

because there is no substitute drug is strong and leads to occasional 

suggestions that there should be some form of publicity to let users 

know that drugs services are indeed able to offer structured help to 

crack users. One community activist called for much more 

conspicuous treatment facilities that crack users could not help but be 

aware of. 

“We need massively improved treatment and rehabilitation 

facilities... The level of treatment needs to improve radically, 

but also accessibility into treatment. The one thing I want to 

see happening is to get a shop front crack service set up in 

the middle of Brixton.” 


Some service providers believe that there are not enough low threshold 

services and that service providers, in the case of crack, need to be 

more tolerant of clients who are only prepared to make a very minimal 

commitment. 

“You need to provide the services and stop the clients from 

having to jump through as many hoops as they do. Because 

the hoops trip them up. And what I want is a greater 

understanding of the kind of life that my clients lead.” 


Building up motivation is agreed to be vital. As already noted, this is 

seen to depend significantly on the quality of relationships established 

with clients (as well as on what support they get from family and 



97 

friends) and some recommend better training for service providers on 

the effects of crack and what it is like coping with cravings. 

Several professionals believe that there is a need for much increased 

investment in residential rehabilitation to cope with the particular needs 

of crack users. Over and over, there is emphasis on the need for 

practical support, especially in housing and resettlement, but also in 

training and employment. Crack users who stop using need a carefully 

contrived and well resourced exit strategy from treatment. A mentoring 

system has been suggested. 

“Drug users need somewhere decent to live in order to get 

their lives back on track. I think there are real problems with 

housing.” 


“High threshold, high intervention, high cost services will help 

individual users, but they may also require things like 

geographical relocation, at least for a period. It’ll also require 

an awful lot of aftercare support which broadly speaking 

doesn’t exist. Resettlement support, that kind of thing. Now 

that’s an expensive package. Now, are we going to continue 

to plug away at these tier 2 and tier 3 and 4 interventions, 

which won’t actually help the chronic population that using 

the vast volume of crack and committing the vast amount of 

crime? There is no move to increase the investment in the 

tier 4 residential type provisions which we have evidence of 

that they work.” 


Many people believe that there is much room for improvement in the 

way prisons treat crack and other dependent drug users. There is 

criticism of the lack of follow up of prisoners who are released after a 

detox. Prisoners on remand are said to be transferred without regard 

to whether they have been awaiting detox in the remand prison. The 

nature of drug treatment in prisons attracts broader criticism. 

“Our remand prisons are our biggest drug detox units. But 

they are not resourced in any way you would remotely call 

humane or effective.” 


“If we could get treatment working through the prison it would 

make an enormous difference. Apparently the method at the 

moment is absolutely brutal.” 


Although some of these points are argued with conviction, no-one 

believes that there is, or is likely to be, any quick or easy way to help 



98 

crack users stop using. Crack treatment seems essentially to be about 

caring for people and giving them a feeling of being cared for. 

“We can all have blue sky thinking, but the reality is, it’s little 

steps. And if you want big results very quickly, you’re not 

going to get them. We’re working with very mixed up people 

with complex needs, and it takes time.” 


10. Residents’ perceptions of crack as a problem 

Caveat: This study of residents’ views is based on small qualitative 

samples. The opinions expressed by our respondents may not be 

representative of opinion more generally. 

10.1 Brent 

10.1.1 Living in Harlesden and Stonebridge 

It was rare for those who took part in the research to have anything 

good to say about living in Stonebridge or Harlesden. The general 

perception was of an area economically depressed and unpopular. 

Several respondents said that they intended to leave. There was a 

feeling that nobody who had other options would chose to live in 

Stonebridge. 

“It’s not a pleasant environment but it hasn’t been for a long 

time... It’s not somewhere that I would see myself staying 

long term.” 

“No, I feel the same really. It’s not an area I feel comfortable 

in.” 


“It is a horrible area... The best bits are probably the 406. It’s 

the quickest way out of it.” 


Several respondents said that there was no sense of community in 

Stonebridge. Some believed this was in part a consequence of the 

numbers of people living in blocks of flats rather than in residential 

streets, but there also seemed to be a sense that most people 

preferred to keep to themselves, partly to avoid trouble (see also 

further below). 



99 

“If you look around you, there’s no houses. Everything is 

flats.” 


“I’ve never seen the people next door, the people downstairs. 

I hear the people above but, you know, you haven’t got that 

situation where you know who to speak to on the street. 

That can’t be good for any of us and that’s what’s been 

created and that doesn’t help the problem at all.” 


“It’s certainly no great feeling of friendliness or warmth or all 

pulling together. You certainly don’t get that feeling... But 

some of that in my case is because it is a flat and therefore 

you shut the door and you’ve got no contact.” 


Business was said to be moving out of the Harlesden/ Stonebridge 

area. Residents had to drive out to go shopping. Pubs had apparently 

been closing; the Conservative Club had closed. 

“Around Harlesden and everywhere, they used to have 

Marks & Sparks, they used to have Woolies. They used to 

have all the big shops. They’ve all gone. I don’t go shopping 

anywhere local now... There’s just a lot of takeaways, an 

awful lot of takeaways.” 


The streets were said to have a neglected look. Several respondents 

complained about the number of abandoned cars in roads close to 

where they lived. 

The problems the area was perceived to be experiencing were 

attributed to a number of familiar causes. Drug abuse (and see section 

10.1.3 below) was generally agreed to be the worst scourge. Some 

respondents thought they could identify underlying causes. Young 

people got into trouble because there was not enough for them to do; 

there were said not to be any youth clubs or sports facilities. 

“This is a generation now that’s been deprived of sports and 

whatever as they were growing up, and now they’re late 

teens, whatever, early twenties.” 


Poor parenting was sometimes blamed, with parents exercising too 

little discipline over their children. Levels of truancy were said to be 

high as a result. Children had no respect for other people, nor for 

public facilities. Many respondents thought discipline would be better if 

parents and teachers were able to administer corporal punishment. 



100 

“Now you can’t even hit your kids... They give too much 

power to children. You get young kids that say⎯’you hit me 

and I’ll take you to court’.” 

“They’re not taught any respect at all, are they?” 


The ills of these Brent neighbourhoods were also sometimes attributed 

to changes in the ethnic mix. The perception was that the housing of 

older white people who had moved out was allocated to recent 

immigrants. Several respondents seemed to exhibit clearly racist 

attitudes. Others appeared to be trying to resist racism but were 

anxious. 

“They are letting in too many immigrants and asylum 

seekers. They are taking away our jobs and our hospital 

facilities, you know, everything.” 


“All you get from them (her children) is⎯’but my friends do it 

(go out at night, etc)’. I’ve never turned round to my kids and 

said⎯’but your friends’. I don’t mean. I’m not racist. But 

their friends are black and they fit in a lot better, you know... 

It is a bad way to feel awkward. You feel terrible. You feel 

isolated.” 


Neighbourhoods made up chiefly of blocks of flats, and a resident 

population dominated by people who were struggling economically, 

were said to contribute to the feeling of social malaise. 

“Drugs is a bad problem definitely. But I personally feel that 

it’s the actual... dwellings that people are given to live in... 

Putting everyone, the poor community, in one big block is 

just a recipe for disaster.” 


There were some references to things getting better, and most 

respondents seemed to feel, despite a degree of cynicism, that the 

authorities were making efforts to improve the environment. 

“It’s getting better actually... Just about on the turn, yes.” 


“Recently it’s run down quite a lot. I think they are striving to 

do better things here, scenic things.” 


Several respondents said that they thought the new Wembley Stadium, 

with all the ancillary commercial developments, would help regenerate 

the borough as a whole. 



101 

However, the poor reputation of Harlesden and Stonebridge was now a 

large part of the problem. 

“They are trying quite hard, aren’t they, to make it a bit better, 

but it doesn’t...” 

“If it’s got a bad name it’s very hard... Once you get the 

name, it takes you years to build a good name up.” 


The dominant mood, despite some acknowledged improvements 

recently, seemed to be that Harlesden and Stonebridge were in ongoing 

decline. 

“In the last few years, it’s gone down and down and down 

and down and down.” 


10.1.2 Crime and law enforcement 

Most respondents believed that people living in Harlesden and 

Stonebridge were afraid of becoming victims of crime and did not feel 

the neighbourhood was secure. There were references to people 

being afraid to go out, especially at night. It seemed to be agreed that 

you were not necessarily safe in some parts even in a car. 

“I work with the elderly and a lot of them are scared to sort of 

go out and then there are certain places I wouldn’t even 

walk, where you wouldn’t even consider walking, day or 

night. So it’s frightening, isn’t it?” 


Only one respondent made a partial stand against the general 

consensus, that the area was frightening. 

“I’ve not been a victim of crime. Been lucky, I suppose. But 

not because I’m being particularly careful in any way.” 


There were a number of complaints that these parts of Brent were not 

adequately policed given the levels of crime and consequent anxiety. 

“There’s also no police presence here. You only see the 

police when something has happened.” 


“I don’t think there is enough police patrolling the street, 

although there are a few more over the estate now.” 




102 

However there were several indications that people thought that 

policing had improved lately. It had become more visible and more 

effective. Areas which had until relatively recently been unsafe were 

much safer. 

“I think the police have got slightly better. Their presence is 

slightly more.... You may not see many but you see more 

than you did.” 


“Four years ago, you’d have said you couldn’t come here (to 

the pub in Stonebridge where the discussion was held). Now 

at least you can walk here.” 


“There was no go areas, wasn’t there? At least now you can 

go there.” 


10.1.3 Awareness of crack and other drugs 

There was a strong and immediate consensus that drug abuse made a 

very significant contribution to crime and other problems in the area. 

Respondents believed that most crime, and most of the prostitution, 

was driven by dependent users raising money to buy drugs. The 

negative images of both Harlesden and Stonebridge were believed to 

derive principally from there being so much drug abuse. 

WHAT CRIME BOTHERS YOU MOST? 

“Drugs.” 

“Drugs.” 

“And crime to feed the habit.” 

“Loads of muggings.” 


“Half the young girls that are on the streets are only there 

because they’re feeding a habit.” 


“I think it’s the ruination of this country, drugs. Big time.” 


Many respondents thought in terms of ‘drugs’ without seeming to 

differentiate much between them. Others believed that heroin was the 

most troublesome drug. 

“It’s this gang culture thing, it’s frightening... There is always 

a mugging... It’s all like drug related really, isn’t it, as far as I 

can make out?” 




103 

“They all say that heroin is the killer, isn’t it.” 

“That’s the top one, isn’t it, heroin?” 


Some were aware of seeing users on the streets frequently, but did not 

know what drug(s) they were abusing. 

“I’ve seen people walking about just totally – you can tell 

they’re out of it and you know it’s not drink.” 


A few respondents identified crack as uniquely pernicious. Crack was, 

they thought, responsible for violence perpetrated by users to raise 

money and by dealers to protect their patch. 

“I was brought up in the area when there was a lot of heroin 

around and that, and like we never had the trouble you’re 

getting now, never... Now, with this crack stuff, you know, the 

violence that goes with it, it’s unbelievable.” 


“You’ve got the drug dealers who are fighting each other to 

get a bigger patch. You’ve got the prostitutes and the pimps 

who are trying to earn their money, and then you’ve got the 

young lads who have then got hooked on this crack, that 

have got to go out mugging, and... when it comes to old 

ladies of 96, they don’t care. They see the money, they don’t 

see anything else.” 


There was some sympathy with the police in dealing with crack users. 

The perception was that the police kept arresting them, but 

immediately they were released they re-offended. 

“They’re arresting people but really can’t do any more than 

that. That must be soul destroying, to keep people in and 

doing the same thing again two nights later.” 


There was some recognition that the problem of what to do with crack 

users might not be as straightforward as first appeared. At least one 

respondent thought prison sentences might be appropriate for use, if 

only as a means of helping users stop using. 

“The only reason I’d put them (users) into prison... would be 

to get them off the streets.” 

“Or get them clean.” 

“They’ve got better things inside to get people off than they 

have on the outside.” 

“I don’t think half of them that are on it would want to come 

off of it.” 




104 

The solution seemed to some people to be more in the hands of the 

criminal justice system than the police. Drug dealers were said to be 

merely “getting their hands slapped”. There was a call for much stiffer 

sentences, especially for ‘pushers’. 

There were two or three references to khat users in the borough. Khat 

was associated with Somalis and seemed to arouse a perhaps 

surprising degree of anger. 

10.1.4 Crack houses 

It did not seem that any of the respondents in Brent had themselves 

lived in close proximity to a crack house, but all were familiar with the 

term. Several said that they knew the location of both current crack 

houses, and ones that had been closed. Others had never positively 

identified a particular flat or a house as a crack house. 

“I know of them but I don’t know where they are.” 


It was widely appreciated that the police and local authorities were 

striving hard to close crack houses. Many respondents said they had 

read about crack houses being closed in the local papers. 

“They closed a few crack houses, didn’t they?” 


“Up round the top there (in Stonebridge) the police really 

went in big time... There were a few crack houses... They 

went in big time and cleared out quite a lot of them.” 


Many respondents seemed to see crack houses as notorious and evil 

without being really sure what they were and what went on in them. A 

minority was much better informed. Several respondents had a good 

understanding of how a crack houses might develop. 

“Someone whose dependent on drugs, then the crack 

dealers will go to that person’s house, ruin their life even 

more by abusing their premises by selling from it, and then 

she’s the one who ends up, or he’s the one who ends up with 

a boarded up house and smashed up and nothing.” 

“And kids taken off her.” 




105 

There was some appreciation amongst a few of why closing crack 

houses could not always be done quickly. 

“They’ve found out now that diving straight in doesn’t work... 

They haven’t got any proof.” 


Several thought that the failure to deal effectively with crack houses 

was down to the slowness, or the leniency, of the criminal justice 

system. 

“I think the council strive to do their very best and I think the 

police do. But I think their hands are tied by the criminal 

justice system.” 


Two or three respondents, whilst they welcomed police action against 

crack houses, argued that closing them was not a long term solution. 

Users would continue to use and another crack house, they thought, 

would spring up close by. Energetic police action displaced rather than 

solved the problem. 

“The police go in... and do mega big raids and stuff like that, 

but at the end of the day it’s just...” 

“It will just move down to the next.” 

“Yes, it just moves into the next house.” 


10.1.5 Communications between public and police about crack 

As elsewhere, these respondents did not think that there was much 

they could do to help the police in relation to crack dealing or crack 

houses. They thought that the police already knew the location of most 

of the crack houses, and the identity of many of the dealers. Their 

problem was evidence more than information. And they were also 

frustrated by the difficulty of using the criminal justice system to get 

users and dealers off the streets. 

There was some willingness to agree that the police deserved the help 

of the public. 

“We need to work with the police certainly because it’s in all 

our interests.” 




106 

But many respondents also said they were reluctant to ‘get involved’. 

Some were uncomfortable about calling the police to give information 

about wrong doing unless it impinged directly on them. There was also 

some fear of retribution. 

10.2 Camden 

“People of our age... they don’t want to deal with the police. 

You get a name for being a nark... You’re going to get your 

door kicked in.” 


10.2.1 Living in the Camden High Street, Clarence Way area 

Most respondents liked living in this part of Camden. The area was 

perceived as having many advantages. It had excellent transport to 

the City and the West End, easy access to Regents Park and 

Hampstead Heath, a great variety of bars and restaurants. 

Respondents of all ages expressed pride in Camden Market’s status as 

an international tourist attraction, and there were references to a 

uniquely cosmopolitan atmosphere, ‘a slightly bohemian feel’. 

Most respondents also had a number of complaints. Drugs and 

associated problems were mentioned almost immediately (see below). 

The large number of fast food outlets were said to generate a huge 

litter problem that was not adequately dealt with. Several older 

respondents were unhappy about graffiti. Levels of crime were evident 

in the numbers of shop fronts that were shuttered after hours. Several 

respondents said that abandoned cars and scooters were 

‘everywhere’. 

“When you report abandoned vehicles nobody bothers to 

come.” 


Because of these and other problems the Market, Parkway, and 

Camden High Street were all said to look ‘tacky’ and uncared for. 

“There is absolutely no pride in cleanliness, there’s no civic 

pride any more.” 




107 

As in all the other boroughs, groups of youths hanging about seemed 

threatening, especially to elderly people. In general, respondents over 

50 seemed to feel that ‘the youth of today’ had no respect for the law or 

for other people. This lack of respect was manifested in all the litter, 

graffiti, disregard for other pedestrians, cycling on pavements, etc. 

Although it seemed, as noted, that all respondents shared a sense of 

pride in the area, there was said not to be much sense of community 

spirit. In part this was attributed to the ethnic mix, in part to a degree of 

anxiety about crime; most residents kept their heads down. 

“It is not a close community. You’ve got West Indians, 

Indians, Pakistanis, Irish. You’ve got everyone. There’s no 

problems but it’s not a close community.”” 



Criminality in this part of Camden was attributed to drugs (see next 

section). Respondents had differing views on whether or not the police 

were handling the situation as well as they could. Older respondents 

were often the most fearful. They avoided going out in the evening; 

one couple interviewed said they loved the cinema, but only went in the 

afternoon because they felt nervous walking the streets at night. Two 

retired ladies said they tried to go out and do their shopping early, 

before too many people were about, and always kept a tight grip on 

their handbags. 

Yet older respondents also tended to have more sympathy with the 

police and to feel that they had been given an impossible job. They 

suspected that police powers were inadequate, or that drug dealing 

was a many-headed hydra⎯any dealers locked up simply meant 

others took their place. 

“The police are making a conscious effort to curb the 

activities of the drug dealers. They keep moving them on but 

they just go somewhere else.” 




108 

“Do the police not have adequate powers to arrest people?... 

Off Hartland Road there is an alleyway we can see into from 

our flat and we see dealers doing their business there all the 

time... We’ve told the police about it but we have never seen 

them do anything about it.” 


Older respondents thought the recently instituted Community Police 

were a good thing⎯helping to instil a greater respect for the law. The 

Community Police, together with other measures designed to frustrate 

drug dealers, meant that things were improving. 

“Things have got better in the last three months since the 

Community Police came in... They’ve also cut down some 

trees and they’ve put some floodlights up at night... You still 

get a lot of needles left on the ground.” 


“Things are getting better with the new Community Policing.” 


By contrast, younger respondents said they felt safe in the area. 

“I feel comfortable walking absolutely anywhere in Camden.” 


But spoke about the police in a very different tone. 

“The police are just a joke. There is no point in calling them 

whatsoever.” 


“There are never, ever any police at Camden Town Tube 

which is where a lot of the muggings happen and where the 

dealers are.” 


“The police do not answer the phone. They won’t even give 

you the number of the local police station if you dial 999... 

There is never anyone there... They always say⎯’there has 

been a major incident tonight’.” 


One young female respondent alleged that two policeman she met on 

the street one evening chatted to her all the way home and invited her 

out. The young were scathing about the Community Police, who they 

said had no powers and, in any case, knocked off at 4-00 in the 

afternoon. There seemed to be a deep-seated cynicism about the 

police among the young. 



109 

Several respondents mentioned the numbers of CCTV cameras in the 

vicinity. Although these seemed to provide a measure of reassurance 

to some older respondents, almost everyone thought what was needed 

was a more visible police presence⎯’real’ police on foot, or on push 

bikes. 

There appeared to be no awareness of Camden’s use of ASBOs, 

possibly because few have been applied for in this part of Camden. 


As already noted, the biggest problem the area faced was considered 

to be drug use and the drug market. Drug users were conspicuous on 

various streets. 

“You see them sometimes on Clarence Way... You look at 

their faces⎯they’ve gone.” 


Almost all respondents said they had heard dealers offering people 

drugs, or making deals; the car park behind Sainsbury’s was identified 

as one place where dealers could reliably be seen. Several 

respondents said they had seen dealers hiding stashes in bushes or 

abandoned cars. Many said they had seen drug users injecting 

themselves in alleyways and other public places, notably on the open 

space by Castlehaven Road. There were many complaints about 

needles left on the ground. There was a general sense that drugs 

were very easily available in the area and that this attracted users from 

other areas. Some respondents thought things were getting worse 

rather than better. 

“I am propositioned by dealers every single day.” 


“It is a completely open market. You can get anything.” 


“I think it’s really hotted up in the last year.” 


Many respondents said that they thought drug dealing and use, and 

associated crime, were getting worse because the drugs market in 

Kings Cross had been disrupted by the building works for the new 



110 

Channel Link Terminal. The problem had migrated to the Camden 

High Street area. There is a contrast here with the view of 

professionals, who give credit for the decline of the market in Kings 

Cross to the use of ASBOs. 

Prostitution was much less frequently mentioned as a problem in 

Camden than in Lambeth. Such prostitution as there was, was 

attributed to drug abuse or mental health problems. Some 

respondents thought that the prostitutes who had formerly frequented 

Kings Cross had migrated to Paddington rather than Camden. 

There was some awareness that crack, specifically, was a growing 

problem. 

“The crack situation is getting much worse... We’re getting a 

lot more muggings and break-ins.” 


But many respondents talked about ‘drugs’. It often seemed that they 

had not identified the potential of crack specifically to produce a big rise 

in aggressive criminality. When most respondents spoke about being 

propositioned by dealers, they were often thinking of cannabis dealers. 

One or two younger respondents said they had been offered heroin 

and crack in Pender Street and Platt Street, but for the majority, the 

image of central Camden as an area steeped in drugs arose from the 

perceptions that there was a lot of cannabis on sale, a lot of ‘junkies’ 

injecting themselves, and a lot of needles. Crack, for many, seemed 

not to be a conspicuous part of the picture. Few respondents gave any 

indication that they appreciated the effects of crack, or the pattern of 

life that heavy use imposed on users. 

There were several references to khat. Cars and vans selling khat 

were said to create traffic problems at the junction of Clarence Way 

and Kentish Town Road. 

The mood of almost all respondents was that something radical 

needed to be done if the problems drugs caused were to be effectively 

addressed. Several older respondents argued strenuously for 

legalising all drugs. They felt the battle to maintain prohibition had 

effectively been lost. Their vision was that legalisation would, at a 



111 

stroke, take dealers off the streets, reduce illness and overdose (by 

ensuring purity and labelling potency) and allow dependent users to 

acquire drugs without resorting to crime. 

“We can’t leave it to the police. They obviously can’t get on 

top of it. We need some government initiative so that there 

isn’t all this money to be made... It has to be made legal so 

that we can take it out of the hands of criminals... If you 

legalised everything the crime rate would drop by 90%.” 


Some younger respondents also thought legalisation had to be 

considered. Another suggestion was that cannabis and other class ‘B’ 

and ‘C’ drugs be legalised, and penalties for class ‘A’ drugs made 

much more severe. 

Both age groups also placed a considerable emphasis on the need for 

better treatment. In their view, the police were simply wasting their 

time arresting and re-arresting users and dealers who would inevitably 

re-offend unless they were helped to overcome their addiction. Part of 

the argument here seemed to be that the way drug users were 

perceived, by both the authorities and the police, was part of the 

problem, contributing to a vicious circle. 

“My feeling is that none of this is going to get any better until 

social attitudes change and people see that addicts are not 

scum but need treatment... We need more investment to 

treat the causes then maybe we can address the effects on 

the local population.” 


“A big problem is that there are not enough places where 

addicts can get treatment.” 


As in all the other four boroughs, there were those in Camden who 

thought that a root cause of drug problems was indiscipline amongst 

children and young people. There was a feeling, as elsewhere, that 

parental authority and control had been dangerously undermined. 

“The young have not been taught how to behave. They use 

foul language. They’ve got no manners... Power has been 

taken away from parents, teachers and the police.... Children 

do what they want.” 




112 


“You gotta go right back to the do gooders, and the discipline 

and they’ve gotta have it. They’ve got to have a certain 

amount of discipline and you’ve gotta catch ‘em really 

young.” 


One elderly respondent had “18 months of hell” when a neighbouring 

flat became a scene of constant comings and goings at all hours of the 

night. At the council’s request, she kept a diary of all movements in 

and out of the apartment for almost the whole period until the tenant 

was finally evicted. The respondent did not know for certain if crack 

had been a factor in all the disruption. 

It did not seem that any other respondents had personally experienced 

the problems a crack house visits on nearby residents. Some seemed 

uncertain what a crack house was; they knew the name from the 

newspapers, and they had a strong negative image of crack houses. A 

few said that they knew where crack houses were in Camden but for 

most of the sample, the problems associated with drugs⎯people 

dealing and using⎯were associated with certain public spaces and 

alleyways, as much as with houses. 

More generally, the majority of respondents did not appear to see crack 

as a new and dangerous development on the drug scene. Many still 

regarded heroin as the drug that caused much the most harm, and 

heroin ‘junkies’ as best exemplifying how drugs destroyed lives. 

However, the Tenant’s Association Chair quoted earlier in the report, 

and a long term resident of the Clarendon Way estate, was an 

exception to this pattern. Several high rise blocks on the estate had 

been blighted by crack users over a period of years, and she knew very 

well the acute problems crack causes. 

A few respondents were aware of the difficulties the authorities faced in 

dealing with crack houses. The sample as a whole appeared to feel 

that the police were fighting a loosing battle against drugs. 



113 

“The authorities have to go through all the set procedures 

before they can close a crack house, and by the time they’ve 

got the paperwork all kosher, they’ve gone.” 


“The police close them but then they reopen two doors 

down.” 


Young people, in particular, and some older respondents, thought that 

the police were unintelligent and unmotivated in their approach to the 

problem of drugs as a whole. They appeared to have no awareness of 

ASBOs and could not see how the problem was going to recede 

without some radical legislative change. There was a striking contrast 

between this mood amongst the public and the belief among 

professionals that Camden was energetic and innovative in its 

approach to crack and other drug problems. 

“Camden has got a reputation for doing very interesting stuff, 

so really we like to be at the forefront.” 



As noted, many respondents, particularly amongst the young, did not 

have much confidence in the police. Nobody in the Camden sample 

seemed to think that improving the quality or speed of intelligence from 

the public to the authorities was likely to make any significant 

difference. 

“The police must get hundreds of calls a day. Nothing ever 

happens.” 


Several respondents said they had called the police about users or 

dealers, but, as they saw it, nothing had happened. One had called 

when she had seen a dealer apparently trying to sell drugs to school 

children. Another had called ‘repeatedly’ about dealers operating from 

cars and on green spaces, and about users injecting themselves in an 

alley, but had not witnessed any action being taken. There was a 

feeling of some bewilderment amongst older respondents especially; 

they could not understand why the police did not rush round and make 

arrests. 



114 

As elsewhere, many respondents thought it could be dangerous to give 

information to the police about drug dealers. There was a quite 

widespread reluctance to ‘get involved’. 

“From our kitchen windows we often see people hiding stuff 

in bushes... We are inclined to turn a blind eye... We’re a bit 

nervous.” 


“If you contacted the police, you’d have to tell them you 

didn’t want to be involved... If you mentioned someone’s 

name, your family is in danger.” 


Widespread ignorance about what Camden authorities were doing 

about drugs seemed to suggest a need for better communications 

aimed at residents about the drug problem. In particular, it seemed 

that many residents were not well informed about the degree to which, 

and why, crack is a distinctively difficult problem. 

10.3 Lambeth 

10.3.1 Living in Brixton and Streatham 

As in Camden and Westminster, many Lambeth respondents took 

pride in where they lived; they believed that Brixton, in particular, was 

unique and had an international reputation as a centre of black street 

culture. There was lots to like, some respondents thought, about parts 

of Lambeth. 

“It is a vibrant area. There is loads going on in Brixton... 

Everything. During the day you have the market and there is 

loads of colour. There are bars, a cinema.” 

“Lots of restaurants.” 

“Big park.” 

“The Fridge.” 

“I think that is everything.” 


Respondents in Lambeth complained less than those in the other three 

boroughs about intimidating groups of youths on the streets. There 

was perhaps, among some, a greater tolerance of youth generally. 

“I think you can give kids swings and roundabouts and all the 

rest but once they get to a certain age they just want to hang 

round street corners and talk... That’s what kids do.” 




115 

There were of course, those who saw things differently, and many 

respondents were unreservedly negative about problems in the 

borough. They complained repeatedly about crime, including violent 

crime, and prostitution, virtually all of which they attributed to drugs. A 

sizeable minority of predominantly white respondents said that they 

could not wait to leave the area. 

“Crackheads and whores.” 

“Gang fights. Coldharbour Lane is really scary.” 

It is more common now. They have all got guns.” 


“You’d want to leave. It’s crap... Muggings, prostitutes 

everywhere.” 


In several neighbourhoods there were strenuous complaints about 

noise, in particular cars which parked with their boot lids up and their 

stereos blaring far into the night. These cars were said to be driven by 

blacks who were there to deal drugs. Local residents, though they felt 

harassed and angry, were said to be too frightened to protest. 

One or two white respondents made comments that perhaps revealed 

a degree of latent racism. Many whites in the sample clearly felt 

intimidated by blacks⎯unable to approach them, for example, to 

complain about noise or other nuisance. Many of the blacks in the 

sample seemed to feel that they were not well enough represented in 

public bodies and not adequately consulted about initiatives that 

affected the black community. In the round, however, there appeared 

to be remarkably little racial point-scoring, whites blaming blacks or 

vice versa⎯in respondents’ accounts of life in the area. 


High rates of crime, and consequently of anxiety, emerged as soon as 

respondents started talking about life in Lambeth. A few respondents 

had had frightening experiences themselves or knew of others who 

had. 

“I was bottled twice at the station and in the High Street I 

have had guns pulled on me. So it is well out of control.” 




116 

“You don’t go down a side road anymore. A couple of mates 

have... actually been pulled over and someone has robbed 

them with a gun.” 


“I remember pulling up in my road at ten o’clock at night – 

and my road is usually really safe – seeing the crack heads 

standing there and thinking⎯’I can’t get out of the car, I am 

going to be mugged. And it was right opposite my house. 

So I sat, locked all the doors. Eventually I dashed into my 

house.” 


There were references to not going out for fear of being mugged by 

drug users. Being propositioned by prostitutes was said to be a 

common occurrence. 

“I won’t go out at night unless I get in a cab... There’s hardly 

any lighting. You don’t feel safe outside your doorstep.” 


“My boyfriend got propositioned. £2.50 for a bit of oral stuff.” 


Many respondents were critical of policing. Some felt that the police 

must be overwhelmed and had simply given up on some areas. Even 

when the police made arrests, culprits seemed to be able to outwit the 

criminal justice system. 

“The police don’t seem to be a deterrent anymore. People 

aren’t scared of them because they don’t seem to be doing 

their job. Even if they pull someone in they get away on a 

technicality.” 


The new ‘Rangers’ were appreciated by some, but derided by others. 

“There are these new Rangers... They’re going round looking 

at the crack houses. They can’t arrest anyone but anything 

they see they report to the police...I think they tried it in a 

couple of other boroughs and it’s worked really well.” 


“They have got these new street patrols... They are people 

walking around in uniforms that can actually do nothing 

except observe and bring in proper police. Basically it is just 

a show of force (sic). It is just taking people off the 

unemployed list really. It is ridiculous.” 

“They don’t even do it in the evening. They just wander the 

streets.” 




117 

Opinions on whether the situation was deteriorating or improving were 

mixed. Perhaps the situation had come to a head in a way that would 

mean that something had to be done. 

“As much as it’s been here for a long time, it’s only now 

getting to the point where it’s starting to really bother 

people... It’s out of control and they really don’t know where 

to start in getting it under control.” 

Group 5, African Caribbean (participants in Crime Forum project), Lambeth 

Some respondents thought the council was beginning to take 

appropriate action. The signs in the street informing residents about 

crack houses, and warning curb crawlers (see also below) were seen 

by some as indicative of a new determination to get things under 

control. 

“Now they are putting these signs up there is definitely more 

police presence.” 


Some respondents also thought that policing had improved, and was 

now more visible. One respondent had got together with other 

residents on her estate and petitioned the council for more street 

patrols. These had materialised, and the respondent was delighted 

that the petition had worked. the council had acted, and fear of crime 

had been reduced. 

There was some confidence that the council was taking steps to 

address prostitution. 

“It got bad with the prostitutes round where we are about a 

year or 18 months ago... The police have just, in Hillside 

Road mainly, put police boards up this last week, 

saying⎯’kerb crawlers will be prosecuted’. Things are 

getting better.” 


“There are issues that are being addressed in this area to 

some degree.” 

“They squeezed a lot (of prostitutes) out of Streatham and 

they turned up on Brixton Hill.” 

“We never had prostitution in Brixton and now it has come 

down to us and it is really bad.” 


Two or three respondents knew about ASBOs but their view seemed to 

be that they were too slow and cumbersome to be of much help to the 

police. 



118 

“To get an ASBO you need 18 months to get one. It doesn’t 

work because it takes too long.” 


There was a fair measure of cynicism among the African-Caribbean 

respondents about the council’s approach to the borough’s problems, 

including crime reduction. Several thought that much more investment 

ought to have been made in community facilities and, especially, in 

community-led initiatives. The drugs and crime epidemic was, in their 

view, a result of straightforward neglect. 

“You’re thinking⎯’do they really want to get rid of this 

problem?’ If they did really want to get rid of this problem 

they would have pumped a lot more money into the borough. 

They are not giving the people in the right places the right 

support and the economical strength to do the job 

(applause).” 


A cynicism driven by a different set of considerations affected many 

white respondents. They felt the council was incompetent, could not 

do the simple things, and was therefore out of its depth dealing with a 

problem as difficult as drugs. 

“We’re riddled with rats and mice and the moment... That’s 

been going on for months now and the council ain’t done shit 

about it. So how are they going to get rid of a crack house?’ 


As in other boroughs, many respondents thought crime and drugs 

problems originated in inadequate parenting. At least one thought the 

benefits system had somehow weakened parents’ authority or their 

sense of responsibility. 

“The system has a way of making parents not be parents.” 


And several thought the borough was paying the price of underinvestment 

in facilities for young people. 

“Over the years a lot of youth services targeted to young 

people have slowly closed down.” 


One respondent in the group of African Caribbeans expressed anxiety 

that the culture in the area had become too tolerant of crime and 



119 

criminals. Amongst disaffected youth, it was said to be fashionable to 

be involved in crime. There was a need for more positive role models. 

“A friend of mine said it’s becoming more fashionable, that 

those who have a criminal record, it’s something wonderful. 

We need to find a way to combat that.” 



‘Drugs’ were often talked of in the generic, and every respondent 

identified them as a very serious problem in Lambeth. 

“I am a mum with children and if I don’t get my children out, 

or drugs don’t get out, then they’ll eventually get my children. 

I’m sure. I’ve seen it all around me.” 


Although they were aware of drug users in the streets and on buses, 

they were not, of course always clear about which drugs were being 

used. 

“I was coming home from work on the number 2 bus, and this 

young guy got on and he was filthy. I could see him keep 

bending down and I could smell burning. I don’t know 

exactly what he was doing but he had tinfoil and I could see 

him inhaling. Anyway, one of the young school kids got on 

and said to him⎯’you stop doing that!’ But then this one 

went mad⎯’shut your face, sit down, I’ll knife you!’ I 

thought⎯’Oh my God!’ Someone said that he was ‘chasing 

the dragon’. What the bloody hell is that? We should really 

know, shouldn’t we?” 


However most respondents in the borough were clearer about the 

menace of crack specifically than respondents in other boroughs. Most 

appeared to be well aware that crack brought distinctive problems 

which could be at least as destructive of the community as heroin or 

alcohol. Prostitution was very clearly linked in their minds with crack. 

“So much has been focussed on heroin or alcohol but I think 

that crack plays the biggest part in the community and that 

we should have a centre in Brixton just for the crack users, 

not anyone else.” 


“The prostitutes and the crack go hand in hand.” 




120 

“The prostitutes are actually not the kind of prostitutes that 

you saw in Streatham. They are crack prostitutes and they 

are attached to houses and they are there because we have 

got the crack houses and they need their crack and they 

need it constantly.” 


Some respondents thought that, although users were intimidating and 

gave the impression that drug use was out of control, it was dealers 

who were the greater problem because dealers, rather than users, 

were responsible for violence with knifes and guns. 

“The thing about crack users is that anything of value they 

will sell, so you won’t see them walking around with a knife or 

a gun because they will sell it. So it is not the users that are 

the problem.” 


Whereas almost everyone in the other boroughs had described crack 

users as very obviously ‘druggy’, dishevelled and ill-looking, one 

respondent in Lambeth said that they were normally “well presented”. 

This view perhaps suggests that there are more recreational users of 

crack in the borough, users who smoke rather than inject. 

As elsewhere, several respondents wanted to make the point that 

drugs were a symptom of other problems as much as a problem in 

themselves. Many people in Brixton and Streatham were 

disadvantaged in important ways. 


“You have to look at why people take drugs in the first place 

and I say it’s because sometimes you’re disillusioned. As a 

young person coming up, what is there for you? You’re not 

being educated properly, the schools are crap... There is so 

much deprivation on those estates. Where are the children 

going to end up at? It’s all about education... Speaking 

about the black community, in Lambeth we have got the 

worst housing, the worst education, the worst jobs. It’s that 

deprivation thing again.” 


There were more respondents in Lambeth than in the other boroughs 

who had had personal experience of what it was like living close to a 

crack house. 

“I have had three in my road. Two have been shut.” 




121 

“We have got one in our block at the moment that is being 

watched.” 


“Crack houses are everywhere.” 

“When we had the crack house every other car was broken 

into.” 


Several respondents had a clear understanding of how crack houses 

develop. 

“It is vulnerable people in the community like lone men. The 

prostitutes befriend them, then they bring in the dealers and 

then the pimps. We have watched three lonely men in our 

road move from their houses.” 


The police were perceived by many to have made enormous efforts, 

particularly in recent months, to close crack house. The council then 

advertised the fact. 

“The other thing was the crack houses. Which then brought 

on prostitution... 

IN YOUR ROAD? 

“Yeah, in the same road.” 

“But the police have done a marvellous job. They really are 

seen and they're up and down. So there's a police presence 

and also they done quite a few raids of houses that we 

know... It was quite nice to see the houses that you knew full 

well were being used as crack houses at last being raided. It 

was like the police were showing everyone in the area 

⎯’Look, we're here now’. And it has got a lot better.” 


“Everywhere you look⎯’crack houses out!’ There’s big 

yellow signs around.” 


“With the crack houses they really seem to have got their act 

together. There was a brilliant woman PC and she was 

communicating with all of us.” 


Although this effort was widely appreciated, several respondents 

thought that closing crack houses brought only a limited respite. Users 

and dealers simply reappeared elsewhere. 

“The childminder across the road, there's a crack house 

there, and she says they raid it but give them a month or two 

the same person is back, they set themselves up in business 

again... I don't think we will ever get rid of the drugs problem. 

You close down one crack house and they open one 

somewhere else. It's been like that since I've lived here.” 




122 

“Basically, if you are not putting away the culprits, then what 

is the point of doing it all? If you stop them doing it on this 

road they will move around the corner.” 


One respondent claimed it had taken the police three years to close a 

crack house near her. There was general frustration that the police 

could seemingly do nothing quickly to put an end to what struck 

residents as outrageously anti-social behaviour. 

“Why does it take so long to close a crack house?” 


“They’ve tried to prevent things happening, but there are still 

muggings, still loads of ructions with the guy who lives at this 

place (opposite her house). People just come and go 24 

hours a day. You think⎯'there's us who pay our rent and do 

everything above board, and you’ve got him who is doing 

something illegal. Why is he still allowed to stay there?’... 

We know it’s drugs because people are coming and going.” 



Respondents from Lambeth seemed to have been more proactive, and 

to have had more success in getting the authorities to act, than 

respondents elsewhere. There were several reports of community 

groups coming together to protest and appeal for something to be 

done. There seemed to be a greater feeling of optimism that the public 

could affect what was done about crack houses. 

“I’ve seen certain places and the community have gone down 

blatantly and stood out there and actually had placards and 

banners saying⎯’this is a crack house, they’re ruining our 

community. If you don’t do something we’ll go to the press’. 

All of a sudden the police come down.” 


“We took all the licence numbers. They were queuing up ten 

deep to get their crack... We gave the registration number 

and nobody seemed to do anything so eventually we got a 

group together who had meetings and we were all together 

as a community.” 

JUST IN THE ONE ROAD? 

“Yes.” 


DO RESIDENTS HAVE A ROLE TO PLAY? 

“Absolutely. They can point them out to the police even 

though nine times out of ten the police know about it. The 

more noise you make about it, the more chance something 

will be done.” 




123 

On the other hand, several respondents also reported the same 

frustrations as were experienced in the other boroughs; the police were 

called, but seemed uninterested and nothing happened. Some crack 

houses had allegedly been notorious for years before anything had 

been done. 

“I have given them details but nothing happened.” 

“You have to queue at the police station.” 

“Brixton and Streatham police hate each other.” 

IS THERE A NUMBER YOU CAN CALL? 

”No.” 


“We offered the police to come in and watch from our houses 

but they never took us up on it because they didn’t have the 

manpower.” 


“We reported one on the estate and it took two years to 

finally get it closed.” 

“There’s too much buck passing.” 

“The police say it’s a council issue.” 

“No-one wants to take responsibility.” 


The council’s recent policy of putting notices in the streets about crack 

houses, and kerb crawling, was generally applauded. The notices 

generated a feeling that something was being done, and, at least in the 

case of prostitution, they were thought to have worked. 

“This year has got better. We still had quite a lot of 

prostitutes round Hillside Road. All of a sudden last week 

there was signs put up saying⎯‘Kerb crawlers will be 

prosecuted’⎯and there's CCTV now, and ever since those 

signs have been put up by the police I haven't seen a 

prostitute. I've got to take my hat off to what the police have 

done, they've done a good job.” 


Letters that the council send out to inform residents about a crack 

house in the vicinity, and to promise action, only attracted comment 

from one respondent⎯the street notices seemed to have had more 

impact. 



124 

“I must admit we did get a letter, it was so funny, a few 

months ago. A letter come through our door and it 

said⎯’This is a letter from the police, there is a crack house 

in your area and we will be raiding it very soon. Sorry for the 

inconvenience this might cause you, bla bla bla.’ So you 

thought⎯’Whose house could it be?’⎯It got to the stage 

where you were all sort of looking at each other in the estate 

thinking⎯’God, is it you?’⎯You've all got your suspicions but 

I don’t feel confident I knew 100%.” 


It was noticeable that the police rather than the council seemed to be 

given the credit for any perceived improvement in problems associated 

with crack. One or two respondents were critical of the council, and 

the money it spent on leaflets, etc. 

“I can’t knock the police, it’s the council, they let us down, 

they’ve always been that way. They send you glossy mags 

about how brilliant they are. They've got a new team in and 

they're going to do this for you, do that. But nothing gets 

done! How much does that glossy mag cost?! They've sent 

out thousands upon thousands to Lambeth residents and 

they've probably been used as chip paper. I have got no 

faith in Lambeth at all.” 


Despite the community actions mentioned above, many respondents, 

as in other boroughs, were nervous or ambivalent about getting in 

touch with the police. Some feared that the police would act in a way 

that would enable them to be identified, and/or that there would be 

retaliation of some kind. 

“I always worry are the police going to come and knock on 

your door then raid the place the next day or something!” 


“Like you sit behind your bedroom window and as much as 

you want the community to be a lot better I don't want to put 

my life or my children's lives in danger. So you kind of close 

your curtains.” 


“Even though you’re doing good you feel as if you’re bringing 

badness on yourself (if you ring the police). You don’t want 

to get involved because the people (crack users) are 

completely nuts. They’re not like us.” 


There was some demand for a clear channel for communicating with 

the police, and better assurances of confidentiality. 



125 

10.4 Westminster 

“If I was suspicious on a place I wouldn’t want the Bill to go 

charging in... If it was worrying me and I thought there was a 

crack house I would ring an anonymous number. But it 

would have to be a nationwide number, like if it was in an 

advert that said⎯’This is where you can ring if you have any 

suspicions.’ And your name wouldn’t be taken. I don’t want 

to be a hero, because nobody wants to be a grass.” 


10.4.1 Living in Lisson Green Estate 

A few respondents spoke very positively about the neighbourhood in 

and around the Green Estate, though they often added a qualification. 

Sometimes the qualification was at least as impressive as the 

appreciation. 

“It's a beautiful area. It's got everything that you would like to 

live round, because you've got Regents Park within five 

minutes. You got Lords cricket ground. You got the Grand 

Union canal you can walk down...You got Little Venice, all 

very arty farty. Nice. It's one of the most sought after areas 

in London. You got a nice market every Saturday, Church 

Street. You got Edgware Road. It was a very good area but 

unfortunately they bring people over to try and better them 

and bring them up to your standard of living but the reverse 

happens where we go down to their way of living.” 


“I like the area (Lisson Green Estate). The only 

inconvenience would be the vandalism.” 


“Well I love it (Lisson Green Estate)”. 

“I think it’s the best part of London.” 

“Definitely.” 

“Apart from the drugs” 

“And the crime.” 


The convenient location of the estate for transport links with Oxford 

Street and the West End attracted positive comment. Access to parks 

was good. The hospitals were said to be good. Several respondents 

clearly felt a sense of pride that they lived in Westminster, which they 

regarded as a class above other boroughs. Westminster was the seat 

of government, the very centre of London. 

A large majority of respondents was white. Early comment on life in 

the area was dominated in much of the fieldwork by references to the 



126 

ethnic mix of people living there and how much this had changed. 

Some respondents clearly regretted the extent of this change. Fear of 

crime, and anxiety generally, seemed, sometimes it appeared 

unthinkingly, to be related to the large numbers of ethnic minorities. 

“It was lovely but not now... They built that estate over there, 

the Lisson Green estate. That was for the Marylebone 

people but it didn't go to them. They brought them in from 

Bethnal Green and all round. But now you got all the 

immigrants in there. Moroccans, Bangladeshi, Chinese, the 

whole lot. Marylebone was a nice place to live in but now I 

wouldn’t go out at night.” 


“When I moved there it was brilliant because there wasn’t 

many houses, it was all green, hence the name, Green, so 

no, it was brilliant... A lot of old people have moved out. 

Where it used to be quite a safe environment for people to 

play, go out and socialise, what’s happened is they’ve all 

moved away now and new people have come in to the 

estate, people from South London, you know, Brixton or 

Wandsworth... and turned it into something different plus 

we’ve got a lot of people, some refugee people as well.” 

“Quite a few Bangladeshi as well, they have their own 

society. Young black boy groups, young Bangladeshi groups 

and white groups and sometimes they conflict as well.” 


A few respondents thought ethnic minorities were responsible for much 

of the crime and for other problems. They blamed the government for 

letting them in. 

“There's a lot of problems... They got to stop letting a lot of 

these immigrants in because since they've been coming in, 

round here we've been with the blacks and Asians for many 

years, but with the new influx of immigrants, they are more 

violent. There seems to be more street robberies, muggings, 

because it's part of their culture where they come from. I 

think the government has got to put a stop to it now because 

we're a small island and we can only take so much.” 


“There are so many muggings round here now.” 

“Because they're all foreigners.” 


Asked about the degree to which they felt there was a sense of 

community in the neighbourhood, most respondents said there was 

none, sometimes attributing this to the coherence of ethnic groups. 

Bengali and Bangladeshi people seemed to attract more negative 

comment than other ethnic groups, in part, it seemed, because they 

were perceived as keeping to themselves and not mixing with others. 



127 

“The Bangladeshis just establish their own community... 

They’re just like fighting with everybody now so it’s basically 

them against the rest, because the white and the black will 

normally amalgamate with each other. The Bangladeshi 

stand in their own right and they don’t really let anybody in. 

You’ll never really, rarely you’ll see a black with a 

Bangladeshi person.” 

“There’s two other white people on my balcony and the rest 

are Bangladeshi, you know, and they all know each other. 

They’re all intermarried.” 


“Irish people and black people are very friendly, and Egyptian 

people, but I'm sorry to have to say that Bengali people are 

not that friendly.” 


“If you see boys on a corner you might get a group of black 

boys with white boys, with mixed race boys. Within that 

group you would very rarely get an Indian boy or an Arab 

boy.” 


Two or three respondents said that they thought ethnic minorities, 

especially those from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, were given 

preferential treatment in the allocation of accommodation because 

housing officers were afraid of being deemed to be racist. 

Efforts to involve people in the Residents’ Association had apparently 

not been successful and response to consultation exercises had been 

poor. 

“We had two (Residents’ Association) meetings recently and 

six people turned up for each meeting. And it isn’t for want of 

trying, you know.” 


“When they were rebuilding the estate, they sent out a lot of 

questionnaires to people. One block, they were asked what 

to do about the central gate, whether to close it or open it. 

They got six replies out of the entire block. People are not 

interested in replying, people don’t have the time.” 


There was spontaneous and early comment on the way teenagers 

gathered in groups⎯sometimes, allegedly, of 50 or 60⎯around the 

area. Many respondents said not enough was provided for them to do. 

“There's nothing round here for teenagers.” 




128 

“The reason we get so much trouble especially round the 

estate here, is that there is nothing for them to do. There's 

no clubs for them to go to. If they had places where they 

could go in and do evening classes, learn a trade...” 


And many said they, or their children, felt threatened by groups of 

youths. There were complaints also about noise at night from young 

people messing about. 

“When all the young lads congregate together and they’re all 

laughing and that and you’ve got to walk past them. 

Sometimes, it feels, you’re waiting for something to happen.” 


“(Teenagers) got nowhere to go and they’re sometimes there 

until three, four o’clock in the morning.” 


As in other boroughs, some respondents thought there was something 

different, something amiss and vaguely threatening, about young 

people ‘nowadays’. The balance of power within families and schools 

had shifted dangerously towards children, and the outlawing of corporal 

punishment was both a symbol and a cause of this. 

“Kids do not play any more, they socialise differently.” 


“This stupid no smacking policy... They’ve actually given 

children rights by taking away parent’s rights, and this is 

where the problem’s happening, you know.” 


“There's too much leisure time for kids… Everything has 

been taken away from the parents. You can't chastise them... 

Because the children know that if you go like that (slapping 

gesture) you'll go to prison, and the kids have got the upper 

hand.” 


Several people complained about the amount of graffiti in all areas of 

the estate, inside as well as outside tower blocks. They attributed it to 

young people with nothing better to do and a few were clearly troubled 

by it, as if it symbolised a fundamental collapse in standards. 

The main issues in this part of Westminster to emerge spontaneously 

were race, the fear generated by groups of youths, and the absence of 

any sense of community. It was also immediately apparent that many 

residents felt seriously threatened by crime levels. However only one 



129 

respondent mentioned having been a victim of crime herself; her door 

had been kicked in, when she was in her flat, by a young teenager. 


Respondents had differing perspectives on crime. Some thought it was 

out of control and the situation was deteriorating. They complained 

about rape, muggings, car theft, and persistent vandalism. 

“Muggings. You get the occasional burglary. Mainly 

muggings and robbery.” 

“Rape.” 

“There was a rape round the back, in full daylight! 11 in the 

morning!” 


“I'm a single mum with a son of nine and the worst thing I 

hate about this area is the car crime. We don't stop getting all 

the young kids in the area looking through all the cars, 

smashing windows for nothing, and it happens all the time.” 


Several respondents said there had been cases of arson on the estate, 

lighted brands pushed through letter boxes. Rubbish was regularly set 

alight. Much of this, the vandalism and break-ins, was attributed to 

gangs of children and youths. Drugs (and see next section) were 

sometimes mentioned as an underlying problem. 

“A lot of the crime is young kids, they haven’t got anything to 

do and.. they think it’s a laugh.” 


“There’s a lot of vandalism.” 

“Its mainly kids that’s on drugs... When they’re bored and you 

know.” 

“There’s nothing for them to do.” 


Some respondents, especially among the elderly, lived in significant 

fear of crime, seemingly associated mainly with groups of youths. 

Although they had not themselves been mugged or burgled, they 

thought the whole atmosphere of the estate was intimidating. 

“You feel like you're living in fear... You're frightened to go 

out.” 

“We don’t go out at all, we're terrified.” 




130 

There were many fewer mentions of prostitution from these 

Westminster residents than there had been from a smaller sample in 

Lambeth. Prostitution seemed not to be a conspicuous problem, 

although a sizeable minority of respondents said there were several 

prostitutes, whom they believed were also drug users (see further 

below). One woman said her husband was repeatedly propositioned. 

“My husband’s been stopped four times by one of the 

prostitutes.” 


There were one or two references to a ‘Community Liaison Officer’, a 

policeman, now retired, who had been ‘brilliant’. He had apparently 

been well known in the community, had always had time for a chat, 

people had trusted him and he had been able to defuse potentially 

difficult situations with a few calm words. In two groups the consensus 

was that crime levels were declining and that residents were now less 

intimidated and fearful than they had been in recent years. 

Some in the sample thought that there was a conspicuous police 

presence on the estate, including police on push bikes. 

“There's always police round here.” 


“There’s a lot more police presence on the Green Estate now 

than there has ever been before. I’ve seen them on bikes, I 

saw about 15 of them on bikes.” 


There was some appreciation, also, of physical changes in the estate 

that were said to have been effective in deterring crime by making it 

more difficult for criminals to escape. Security had been improved at 

the entrances to blocks. 

“On the estate for example, in the good old days … they had 

all buildings interconnected, which meant crime was quite 

rife... The people would actually run away, escape, a lot of 

escape routes. In the last four or five years, they’ve taken it 

away. They’ve given security in each of the buildings and 

that effectively has reduced crime.” 


However, many respondents, at least half, were unhappy about 

policing currently. It was argued that the police were now anonymous 

and did not engage with the community, there were not enough of them 



131 

on the estate, they were not there at the right times, they did not 

respond when called for, there was no consistency of personnel, etc. 

“They (police) came up here the other night. I was quite 

surprised to see them. They were on the beat, walking 

round... It's the first I've ever seen them all the years I've 

lived here.” 


“We've got a community copper on the estate... You won’t 

see him after 5 o'clock because they won't walk around here 

after a certain time.” 


“(The police) say⎯‘well, what can we do if the council don't 

tell us?’ Then the council say⎯‘but we do tell them, but they 

don't do nothing.’ Over your block a bloke got in the lift, 

followed a guy up and... pulled out a big stick and started 

bashing him. The guy... said to the woman who's the warden 

there⎯‘why didn't you phone the police?’ She said⎯‘what's 

the point of phoning the police? All you get is⎯‘we're too 

busy to deal with it, we'll send someone round later.’ Now 

that is someone making a threat with a weapon and years 

ago that was top priority and they'd have been there before 

you put down the phone. Now it’s⎯‘can you wait 2 hours?’” 


“You won’t see the same face (among the police) twice... 

Never, and they’re very unapproachable.” 


One respondent believed that levels of policing had fallen since 

September 11 th . 

“The estate was getting very quiet and we had quite a decent 

level of policing but then since, I have to say since 

September 11 th , we’ve never had the same amount of 

policing... So many of our police have been occupied with 

other things... This is another thing that within the community 

causes a bit of a ruckus. If you cross Marylebone Road, 

going Edgware Road towards Marble Arch, you’ll fall over 

police. Yet on the estate, if we phone them sometimes they 

might be 20, 30 minutes coming... Then you get people 

saying⎯‘oh, it’s all right for the Arabs, they’re protected, 

they’ve got all the police down there’.” 


Two respondents thought that the police were not subtle enough in 

their approach to catching wrong-doers; more of them needed to be in 

plain clothes. 



132 

“I think it would be better if the police could go around in plain 

clothes.” 

“And scruffy, so they could move among them, then they'd 

know exactly what's going on.” 


There were dismissive references in one group to ‘City Guardians’ 

(also referred to as ‘Guardian Angels’). 

“They don’t make no difference.” 

“They're just like the Neighbourhood Watch really. They’re 

supposed to be like police but...” 


Some respondents thought the problems on the estate were more 

accurately attributed to poor parenting than poor policing. 

“I don’t think it’s down to the police you know, it’s down to the 

parents. Where’s the parents? What are the parents doing? 

Why are they letting their children run riot? The way I see it 

it’s like they rule the roost at home, do you know what I 

mean? It’s like the kids are ruling the house, they can go out 

and do what they want. When the police come to their 

door⎯‘oh yeah, I’ll deal with my child yeah, yeah.’ The next 

night they’re out again.” 



Awareness of drug abuse on the estate was very uneven. Some 

respondents were not aware that there was any. One described hard 

drug use as “minimal”. In Group 9 three of the six respondents said 

they did not believe that drugs were a problem. 

On the other hand, many other respondents said that drug use was 

rife. A few thought the main drug was cannabis. They believed that 

most teenagers on the estate⎯whom they found intimidating in large 

groups⎯were smoking cannabis as they hung about. One or two 

respondents were alarmed by this; they viewed all drug taking as 

threatening and thought that cannabis use probably led to petty theft, 

other wrong doing, and ultimately to hard drug use. Others were more 

neutral or sympathetic towards cannabis. 



133 

WHAT ARE THE WORST THINGS? 

“Well its just drugs mainly. It’s just drugs are so easily and 

like readily available... A lot of kids tend to get on that 

bandwagon, you know what I mean? And it stems from 

there. Nicking from shops, little things like that... A lot of car 

theft.” 


“A lot of young people are smoking and dealing cannabis. 

It’s not a problem but it’s not a very good culture.” 


“I don’t think you’re talking major, major drugs... It’s just, you 

can feel the undercurrent here.” 


“You can walk up and down and see them all sitting puffing 

but that ain’t such a bad thing.” 


A few residents thought alcohol might be an unhelpful factor but did not 

believe that many young people were using or dealing in drugs. It was 

the fact that they were in large groups that could be alarming. 

“They (youths) just seem to be grouping. I don’t think it’s 

centralised around the drugs. A lot of the time they’re just 

there drinking… They’re not necessarily dealing or anything.” 


Many respondents saw young people as responsible for most of what 

they regretted about the estate⎯the petty crime, the noise, the graffiti, 

the intimidating presence. They thought these young people were 

smoking cannabis, but hard drugs seemed not to have come into focus 

for them as driving the deterioration they thought they saw around 

them. 

In contrast, a sizeable minority of respondents blamed drug abuse for 

most of the estate’s problems. One interviewee said she believed that 

drugs were responsible for at least 90% of the crime on the estate. 

“Drugs is a big problem here... Also the children… You find 

lots of damage, abuse everywhere.” 


“I loved it when I first came here, everybody was happy and 

social. You could trust everybody round here. Not now.” 

WAS IT A SUDDEN CHANGE? 

“It's changed over 15 years. I think it's because of the drugs, 

which are more available... They're shocking now, absolutely 

shocking.” 

“If they got rid of the drugs the area could go back to what it 

was 10 or 15 years ago.” 




134 

‘Drugs’ were seen by some as a huge temptation for young people 

living in relatively deprived circumstances financially and lacking, as 

they saw it, opportunities to earn money legally. Getting interested in 

drugs, and in dealing them, was seen as ‘going bad’, the antithesis of 

getting a good education and a good start in adult life. 

“It’s becoming like a ghetto... It’s drugs is going to bring it 

down most definitely because drugs is why kids nowadays 

don’t want education. They don’t want to work for things in 

life. They want easy money and education is the last thing at 

the back of their mind... ‘You can earn £30, £40 in one 

minute’, so they’ll do it and once they’ve got that £30, and 

they’ve only walked down the road and delivered something, 

they’re hooked... Education goes out the window, future goes 

out the window.” 


There were many references to ‘drug users’ and it often seemed, 

understandably, that residents did not concern themselves with what 

drugs were involved. 

“I’ve got a flat that’s upstairs from me, now that’s a one 

bedroomed flat ‘cause they’re all one bedrooms in my block. 

You’ve got about nine people living in a one, you know, one 

bedroomed flat. All of them’s on drugs. All of them is on 

drugs.” 


“You see the people walking around don’t you, people who 

need to get money for these very sad habits... They walk 

around with bags of chicken and meat and they ask you if 

you want to buy say £50 worth of meat for £25...You get to 

know these people.” 


Not all of those who saw drugs as the major underlying problem for the 

estate had focused on crack as contributing to this problem. Some 

considered heroin to be the worst drug, in part because they 

associated syringes strongly with heroin. 

“You see loads of skag heads walking down the street, out of 

their nut.” 


There were references to caretakers having to sweep up used needles 

and other detritus, allegedly every morning, from the stairways in some 

blocks. 



135 

Other respondents were aware of crack and crack houses (see below). 

Heroin and crack were linked together as twin evils. 

“Over the back you see all the syringes lying around... Why 

isn't the government cleaning the estate up? If you know 

that you've got a block that is full of crack heads, skag 

heads, prostitutes, whatever, why put them in there?... Evict 

them!” 


And a few respondents saw crack as particularly threatening. 

“Crack, as you know, use it once and you’re hooked.” 


“When you’re on crack and you’re heavily into crack you’re 

disgusting. You’re face is full of spots... You’re very 

paranoid, very paranoid and you’re skinny and you’re 

unkempt.” 


“When they're on crack they're looking for their next hit.” 

“Yeah, they'll rob anyone, do anything.” 


Crack was said to be very readily available on the estate, although it 

was not clear how respondents knew this. 

“I’ve never actually seen crack before... I couldn’t tell you 

what it looks like or how it’s taken or anything like that... It’s 

another drug that seems to be very readily available... It’s 

very easily obtained... Wherever you go that drug is around.” 


The link between prostitution and crack was clear to a few residents, 

although many seemed unaware that there were any sex workers on 

the estate. 

“Women will do anything for a rock because they’re 

desperate. They will offer you themselves for any rock. I 

mean how low can you get? And they’ve got a houseful of 

kids at home, that’s the sad thing. I mean I know a couple of 

women who are on it hard and it sickens me to think well 

you’ve got a houseful of kids and you don’t care.” 


There were several references to drug dealers operating from the 

estate, although it was not clear what drugs were being sold. The 

appeal of dealing to young people was well understood. 



136 

“Three, four o’clock in the morning, you’ll see cars coming in 

and out, and I’ve actually observed that and what happens is, 

they’re there for about two or three minutes. Somebody 

approaches the car, they get out, they shake hands, 

something happens and then they get back in the car and off 

they go. Half an hour later, they’ll be back. So I think they’re 

using the estate as a way of selling their wares.” 


“Well there's no work. You can't find work or you don’t want 

to work, so you find the easiest way out and it's like⎯‘him up 

the road ain’t doing much but he's got a car’." 

“You can walk round here any night and see packets 

changing hands, money changing hands.” 


Respondents in one group believed that young Asians were actively 

dealing in drugs. The evidence quoted in support of this allegation was 

that the young men involved all had “fancy cars and designer clothes”. 

As elsewhere, the drug problem gave many residents a sense of injury. 

Drugs were illegal; how could it be that such conspicuous drug use 

could go so apparently disregarded and unpunished? Many people 

thought “something ought to be done”⎯they wanted the drug problem 

dealt with, but they were rarely clear how to go about it. 

WHAT WOULD YOU WANT TO BE DONE ABOUT DRUGS? 

“Get them off the streets for a start.” 

“But what can you do? You can't lock them up.” 


“If they’re identified, I think they should be forced to go to 

drug rehab, they must... If they get picked up a certain 

amount of times, I think they should just be flung into rehab... 

I think drug abusers should be sectioned... You’re not in 

control, so someone else has to take control of you, so I think 

users should be all slung into rehab, and I think they should 

be monitored.” 


“If you got rid of the dealers the users would need to go 

elsewhere. It's a dilemma the government, any government, 

is in.” 

“Yeah pushing it from one place to another.” 

“Get everyone off the Isle of White and get all the junkies 

onto the Isle of White. . … But to get hold of it you got to stop 

the importation.” 


A few respondents had a different perspective and spoke about the 

underlying causes of drug abuse. They wanted more investment in 

facilities for young people. Several people suggested bringing back 

National Service. There was quite a widespread feeling, again as 



137 

elsewhere, that young people were going off the rails and earlier 

intervention was needed if the drug problem was not to get worse. 


“More for the kids.” 

“Yeah, for teenagers. And crack down on the car crime. 

Those kids doing the car crime think they're above the law 

now so what are they going to do in a couple of years time?” 

“They're going to go onto bigger and worse things. Drugs.” 


“I'd like to see them all getting help, I would... 

YOU FEEL SYMPATHETIC TOWARDS THEM? 

“Yes of course. But they'd all have to do it at the same time 

to get better, and they'd have to get rid of those drug barons. 

But they're all god's creatures, they all belong to somebody. 

If it was my son or daughter, I'd be a heartbroken woman.” 


A substantial minority of respondents living on the Green Estate were 

not aware of there being, or having been, crack houses there. This 

minority included some of those who had said that drug taking was a 

major problem for the estate. They had heard of crack houses, but 

knew of them entirely from the media. For them, drug use, and crack 

use, seemed not to focus on particular locations, although they 

believed that some blocks of flats were much more troubled by drug 

taking than others. 

A majority believed that there were crack houses on the estate, 

although the scale of the problem was variously perceived. Some 

respondents thought that a crack house might develop perhaps once or 

twice a year, and would eventually be closed by the authorities. Others 

thought that there were always a good number of crack houses 

operating, and that as soon as one was closed, another would open 

elsewhere. Two blocks, Tickford and Simpson, were said to be “used 

to house people who’ve just come out of gaol” and were especially 

associated with crack houses. 

One respondent said she had lived next to a crack house. 

“Imagine if it was next door to you, it would be terrible.” 

“I've lived next door to a crack house. It's frightening.” 




138 

Several residents had a good understanding of how crack houses 

develop. 

“We’ve got about four prostitutes at the moment, about four 

of them, and what happens is they target what you would call 

vulnerable people, people with learning difficulties, people 

you know, sort of at risk in the community, and they take over 

their flat and you have a hell of a job to get them out.” 


“You've got a lot of care in the community, a lot of single 

people over there that might be it. I suppose they allow them 

in, then they start taking over, and then your house becomes 

a crack house. Heroin addicts are trapped by other heroin 

addicts. What they do, say one of them has got their own 

flat, then another heroin addict will come and do their drugs, 

then another one, then all of a sudden you've got a whole 

gang of them using that place. Then that's where you get 

your prostitutes.” 


Crack houses were said to be immediately identifiable because of all 

the activity⎯people coming and going at all times of the day and night. 

“We learn about a crack house within days because what 

would happen is the people who live either side of them, they 

would start complaining and we would hear it loud and 

clear... The coming and going all the time of the day and 

night.” 


“You see a lot of people to-ing and fro-ing more than a 

normal household, and a different array of people going in.” 


However several respondents said that they usually only got to know 

about a crack house after it had been closed. A kicked-down doorway 

was regarded as one sign that a crack house had been raided by the 

police. 

It was repeatedly alleged that crack houses ‘reopened’, often in the 

same accommodation, after they had been raided by the police. 

“There is crack houses. There has been crack houses and 

they've shut them down, but the minute they shut them down 

they're open again the next day.” 


“I watched the police go in and go to all the crack houses… 

They moved all the prostitutes out... all the crack heads… 

And I watched them all walk past and I was sitting outside my 

house the next day, and they were all back in again.” 




139 

“Anyway as soon as one is closed down they'd find a new 

place to go.” 

“One door is open and another door is closed.” 

“(The Mozart Estate) used to be all crack houses there at 

one time but the police moved them on. 

“Now they're moving in round here.” 

“They close one down then another opens, you can’t win.” 


Many residents were contemptuous of the apparent inability of the 

authorities to close crack houses definitively. It seemed to them that 

the police, or the council, were inefficient, or were not prepared to give 

the issue sufficient priority. 

However, a few respondents understood that closing a crack house 

was not as easy as might first appear. The police needed to collect 

evidence, which took time. 

“We know who they (dependent drug users) are, the police 

know who they are, the Council knows who they are, there’s 

no way that we could just pick them up and take them off 

somewhere else... They can’t do anything about it unless 

they have evidence.” 


The various legal procedures that needed to be followed also took 

time. Residents were understandably thinking, meanwhile, that nothing 

at all was happening. 

“Sometimes, depending on what information they can gather, 

they have to wait. I mean this is where people get frustrated 

on the estate. You say to them⎯‘yes, something is 

happening, it is happening but it’s a long way round 

happening, you know. They have to go through all certain 

procedures, and it can take two or three months before they 

actually, you know, raid this place... You have to sit and wait’. 

And everybody thinks nothing’s been done. This is where we 

get a complaint and then everybody comes and says look 

can you not do anything about that?… The fault is the legal 

side of it... Everything takes so long, because what happens 

is they get an eviction order, the people will wait right until 

the last day before the eviction order is in court.” 


Unless those operating or using the crack house could be convicted 

and sentenced⎯which was often not the case, because they were 

alerted to impending police action and destroyed the evidence⎯there 

might be little the authorities could do to prevent them instigating 

another crack house. 



140 

“There was a crack house there. But you see what 

happened was the council, they put all the right paperwork in 

place and evicted these people, and we worked long and 

hard, really long and hard, and I mean it left you sort of 

heartbroken at the end because they evicted them from one 

flat and they moved into another flat on the estate and there 

wasn’t anything the council you know, could do about it.” 


“There are so many crack houses round here it's 

unbelievable. And they're all on mobile phones and they say 

‘the police is coming’ and whatever stuff they have, they hide 

it away. They never get nothing in them houses but that's 

where all the stuff is dealt from.” 


A few respondents blamed the criminal justice system; they thought the 

it was obvious that the sort of anti-social behaviour that crack houses 

produced ought to be punishable, and if it was not, then the law 

needed to be changed. There was no mention of ASBOs. 

There were a few references to crack houses being successfully 

closed. 

“One lot moves into a flat and they contact each other by 

mobile and there must be 10 or 12 of them sleeping in a 1 

bedroom flat!... Well this month somebody got evicted... I 

heard they're going to court and they're getting evicted.” 


“I suppose it's better than it was… That's gone now, the 

crack house.” 


But the prevailing mood was one of frustration and resentment. Most 

respondents felt that the drug problem was not being tackled 

effectively. One or two respondents thought it was short sighted to 

blame the authorities, or even the drug users. They believed it was 

deprivation and benefit dependency which drove drug use. 

“You can’t say⎯‘oh, crack dealers are causing the situation 

in this estate’. Because they sense a vulnerability... When 

you get a load of people on income support, or on no 

education, on welfare, also on benefit system, there’s going 

to be people who are at a low ebb, and want money, and…” 



Many respondents said they would certainly be in touch with the police 

if they thought a crack house was developing close to them. 



141 

“If (a crack house) was next door to me… I’d call the Police 

every five minutes.” 


But most thought the police were adequately informed about the 

location of crack houses anyway. 

“The police are round the estate every day... They know 

what’s going on. The Council know… They try and kick them 

out and then they come back. What can we do?” 


And negative attitudes towards giving the police information were more 

common amongst this Westminster sample than had been the case 

elsewhere. Several respondents, in one group particularly, did not see 

the police as an unambiguous force for good. Police-community 

relations were said by some to be poor on the Green Estate. 

“I’m nervous of police officers and stuff, simply because I 

think everyone is slightly nervous of the law, you know. You 

have that instinct don’t you, whenever you see a police 

officer you think shit, am I being…” 


“If you really want to get something across to the police, you 

could do it, but… I just think there is a barrier there between 

the police and the general public. I can’t actually pinpoint it 

for one actual aspect, it’s just something that’s there.” 

ARE YOU SAYING YOU DON’T TRUST THE POLICE? 

“No I don’t, not at all.” 

“They haven’t got a good rapport with the community.” 


“If you see something going on out there and you phone the 

police, you don’t get nothing. The police ain’t doing nothing 

for us so why should we do anything for them? And it's an 

unwritten law, when you are on the street like us you don’t 

involve the police, you keep away from the police, because 

they're not there for us.” 

“We’ve got to live here.” 


Fear of reprisals was widespread. 

“You're frightened to open your mouth in case they put a 

knife in your back.” 


“If the boys thought we spoke to the police they'd have us... If 

you get involved with the police you’re dead yourself.” 




142 

“The thing is, when you’ve got young kids, you don’t want 

police knocking on your door. You don’t go and feed the 

police information, because...” 

“The question is, how can you be sure that any information 

you pass on isn’t going to get back to you in any way, shape 

or form?” 


“I phoned up one night about the guy who was playing some 

music at 4 in the morning and he (policeman) said⎯’well 

what do you want me to do?’ I said⎯‘what you're paid for, to 

go round and knock on the door.’ He said⎯‘well I know that 

address, will you come round there with me?’ I said⎯‘do 

you want me to get the granny bashed out of me? No, I got 

to live here, you do it..., that's why you get paid’... That's how 

it is. Go to court, give your name and address? For what? 

For the guy to be doing it the next week? I then get 

intimidated? You can always get intimidated by people for 

things like that.” 


It was not clear that this fear attached to drug dealers or takers as 

much as to gangs of youths. An incidence was cited of someone 

intervening and suffering as a result. 

“There's a lot of them, they come from the 4 Feathers and 

there's a lot of them round the back where the sheds are. 

They congregate there, and the back staircase. Teenagers. 

And he's (a neighbour) like a Neighbourhood Watch fellow 

and... he went up there and told them to clear off. Then at 12 

o'clock the brick come through his window.” 


Nobody seemed to think that the way forward, in relation to drug 

problems, was for the public to be more proactive in contacting the 

authorities. 



APPENDIX 

Documents consulted for the desk research 



Sources consulted for the desk research 

Abigail, N. Tackling Crack: A National Plan. Requirements for DATs. Jan 

2003 

Abigail, N. The Scale of the Problem and its Location. Home Office, 3 Jan 

2003 

Burgess, R: Disrupting Crack Markets. A Practice Guide, Drug Strategy 

Directorate, Home Office 

Camden Anti-Social Behaviour Action Group (ASBAG): Crack Cocaine in 

Camden. ?April 2003 

Camden Council: Submission to the Home Affairs Select Committee on ‘The 

Government’s Drug Policy: Is it Working?’ Sept 2001 

Camden DAT: Camden drug and alcohol strategy 2002-5 

City Roads: Building a Better Future, Annual Review year ended 31 March 

2001 

City Roads: Building Bridges, Annual Review year ended 31 March 2002 

Dept of Health, Models of Care for substance misuse treatment Feb 2002 

GLADA (Greater London Alcohol and Drug Alliance): London: The highs and 

lows. A report from the Greater London Alcohol and Drug Alliance 

incorporating the findings from the London Drug Indicators Project. Feb 2003 

Harocopos, Alex; Dennis, Dezlee; Turnbull, Paul J.; Parsons, Jim; and Hough 

Mike: On the Rocks: A Follow-up Study of Crack users in London, Mar 2003 

Hungerford Drug Project: Activity Report April 2001 – March 2002 

Prince, Bridget. Hungerford Drug Project: Qualitative interviews of the clients 

of the mobile needle exchange. Final Report, Jan 2003 

Metropolitan Police Service: Drugs Strategy 2003 to 2006 

RBKC, Cabinet meeting, 3 rd Oct 2002. Report by the executive director of 

housing and social services. Royal Borough Review of Substance Use 

Services: Purpose and Scoping Report 

RBKC Crack House Protocol 2002 

Scottish Executive, Scottish Advisory Committee on Drug Misuse, 

Psychostimulant Working Group Report, June 2002 



‘Smith, Sara’ (a pseudonym): The Crack Den Next Door, article in The 

Guardian, 11 Mar 2003 

Stonebridge Housing Action Trust. Towards a safer Stonebridge 2002 

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), 

Arlington, Virginia, USA: Women in Treatment for Smoked Cocaine. The 

DASIS Report, July 13, 2001 

Turning Point: Shaping Social Change, Annual Report 2001-2002 

Your Community, Your Problem. Crack Cocaine Conference, Birmingham, 

24-25 June 2002, Conference Report

Crack Cocaine in London - Canadian Harm Reduction Network

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