Clubs, drugs and doormen

The concentration of large numbers of young people at dance venues – night-clubs, pubs or large warehouses – provides an attractive lure to drug dealers who see these venues as potentially lucrative market places. This report shows how such venues can become the target of organised crime seeking to operate there through a strategy of ‘control the doors, control the floors’. Local drug misuse strategies must include action to disrupt and prevent such organised dealing from becoming established in dance venues. This report provides examples of good practice for the police, local authorities and venue managers in achieving this.<br/>Two important ways in which this can be done are through improving and enforcing licensing conditions and registration of door staff, and both are areas which are currently receiving government attention. Guidance on introducing the new powers provided by the Public Entertainment Licences (Drugs Misuse) Act 1997 will shortly be published, and the Government is currently consulting on how the private security industry, which includes club door staff, might be regulated. Developments in both these areas will enable local action to better protect young people from drug misuse in dance venues.