The state of the (student) unions

• Student unions cost taxpayers and students £165 million per annum, £225 per student over a three year degree course. 

• Student unions employ some 600 full time sabbatical officers 

• Just 1-in-10 students participate in student union elections

• While universities generally receive 80% satisfaction rates, barely over half of students, a mere 56%, think that their student union does a good job of representing their academic interests. 

• Student Unions give £4 million of financing to the National Union of Students (NUS), but just 3% of students vote in the elections that choose delegates who decide NUS policy and select its officers, with turnout often as low as 0.5%. 

The report, from the free market Adam Smith Institute, argues that student unions are perceived as ineffective by students, lack democratic legitimacy, and undermine freedom of association and expression. Extraordinarily, it finds that student unions that receive higher block grants from universities tend to be poorer performing in the National Student Survey. 

Student unions have played a critical role in the worsening free speech crisis on campus in recent years: banning speakers they don’t like, blocking the sale of particular publications, failing to prevent or encouraging violence at meetings, seeking to approve speeches in advance, blocking the formation of free speech societies, imposing rules on how meetings should be conducted, barring certain groups on whim from freshers’ fairs, and deterring speakers by imposing complex bureaucratic procedures on them.

The report proposes that student unions should be split into different components dealing with recreational,sports and academic functions, with only those receiving university funding – itself made up in large part by taxpayers’ money. The political part should become optional, funded by students who opt to join. Such  bodies should only receive official recognition if more than half of students become members. 

The report also argues that if the National Union of Students (NUS) wishes to gather funds from students it should do so from individual students and not draw on monies compulsorily gathered by student unions from the taxpayer and students. 

Free speech, a central tenet of universities in the Western world, has come under intense threat in recent years. Universities should bolster the rights of students and speakers to speak their mind. No student representative body of any type should have any involvement in regulating the rights to free speech on campus. The authors argue that the responsibility for implementing legal requirements should rest solely with universities, not extremist student unions, and that the provisions in law regarding free speech should be strengthened to prevent universities or other bodies using procedural mechanisms to restrict speech others may find distasteful. 

The Office for Students (OfS) should become the main regulator of student bodies, representative and otherwise, in respect of both free speech and other matters. The OfS should also oversee the transition to the new arrangements proposed.

Student unions are in the business of promoting engagement through freebies, the report alleges, trying to induce higher turnouts by providing free pizza, discounts at student shops, and even free ice creams — using student money to try and give the unions more legitimacy. Turnout though, remains low, with the average turnout at a British student union election just 11%. 

Elections at universities for their representatives to the NUS are of even less interest. At Aberdeen University just 79 people (or 0.5% of the student body) voted for their university’s representatives. At UCL just 0.9% did. The average across UK universities is just 3.2%.

Student unions are highly political organisations with little claim to a democratic mandate. The report looks at a number of egregious examples including campaigns to abolish the Prevent counter-terrorism programm, and to push for decolonisation, demilitarisation, boycott of Israel and divestment from fossil fuel, arms and tobacco.

In 2018, the Manchester University Students’ Union decided that students shouldn’t be allowed to read verses from Rudyard Kiplng’s poem ‘If’, frequently voted the nation’s favourite poem, which the university had painted on a wall. Fatima Abid, the general secretary of Manchester’s student union, said that after seeing the Kipling poem on the wall, student leaders immediately decided that it must be taken down. They proceeded to vandalise it. The Oxford University student union sought to censor textbooks and lectures.

Bans have been pushed on types of food (including the sale of beef at the LSE, Edinburgh, and the UEA), fancy dress (at Kent, Oxford, and Edinburgh), speakers like Julie Bindel and Peter Hitchens, registration of new student societies (including the Nietzsche Society at UCL, or the Protection of Unborn Children at Glasgow), and even bans on clapping (Oxford and Manchester) or the waving of arms at Edinburgh.

The free market think tank suggests that student unions should be refocussed on the key functions that benefit students with just four activities deserving of compulsory funding, proposing 15 solutions to address ineffectiveness, extremist activities, and lack of democratic legitimacy in the student union system, including:

• splitting a student union into social activities, a sports association, and an academic council, elected through a system of class and faculty representatives rather than centrally;

• limiting funding from university grants to social, recreational and entertainment activities; student societies; sports; and academic representation.

• making student societies independent from unions and directly supported by universities and members;

• returning excess funds to students;

• allowing establishment of broader student representative councils, but with voluntary membership and without compulsory student funding;

• preventing pass-through funding of student or taxpayer money to national bodies, like the NUS; 

• not allowing student bodies to limit freedom of expression; and strengthening provisions in law to prevent universities from limiting freedom of expression, including by using procedural mechanisms to frustrate freedom of expression or passing along security costs to student societies.

Report author Max Young:

“For too long, a tiny minority of extremists have imposed their will on the student body. The reforms we propose, by depoliticising student unions, will make universities much more pleasant and productive places to study. Free of censorship and aggressive hectoring, students will be able to get on with enjoying the university experience and sharing ideas freely.

Foreword author Robert Halfon MP, Chair, House of Commons Education Committee:

“Across our universities and colleges, far too often, freedom of expression and intellectual curiosity on campus are being deeply eroded because of minority political activism.

“The range of policy proposals set out in this report deserves careful consideration. The suggestion that the old Scottish approach of split functions could provide a useful model is certainly an intriguing one. By making the political part of student unions voluntary, ordinary students would no longer be required to finance political activities of which they did not approve. At the same time, resources could be focussed on those functions that students do appreciate, such as decent social and recreational facilities, better student sports, and more effective academic representation.

“These are interesting ideas and certainly worthy of further debate.”

Sajid Javid MP:

“British universities are meant to be places of open debate and intellectual freedom. Their proud tradition of liberalism is foundational for bringing students into contact with new and challenging ideas.

“That tradition is under threat. In Student Unions across the UK, an intolerant minority is seeking to silence those they disagree with under the banner of no-platforming and safe spaces. Their campaign of censorship is an assault on one of our most precious and fundamental rights – freedom of speech.

“Championing students by protecting legal free speech should be one of the higher education sector’s top priorities. I’m pleased the Adam Smith Institute has chosen to focus on this important issue.”

Andrew Lewer MP:

"Having served as a university governor for nine years, I am particularly interested to read this thought provoking report on reform of Student Unions. Although some SUs are relatively benign, many others are not and this Report both explains how this can come about under the current rules and puts forward some stimulating proposals for improvement. Identity politics, 'woke' and 'cancel culture' represent serious threats to our freedoms as a nation and taking them on must be taken equally seriously."

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Matt Kilcoyne: matt@adamsmith.org | 07904 099599.

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.

Internal Market empowers British consumers

With the Internal Market Bill being placed before Parliament today (Wednesday 9th September 2020), Matt Kilcoyne Deputy Director of the Adam Smith Institute says:

"It is right that if the United Kingdom is to continue to allow its consumers to access goods and services from all parts without impediment. 

"The UK is a single nation state, and it deserves an internal market that promotes free trade. It is not the remit of the devolved administrations to kowtow to Welsh and Scottish nationalists by putting up barriers to trade between the British peoples."

"Mutual recognition means all devolved administrations are treated with equal respect as Westminster but that it is ultimately consumers that will have the final say over the standards they accept."

For further comment or to arrange an interview please contact Matt on 07904099599 or email matt@adamsmith.org

Australian Senator calls for free movement with UK & CANZUK

• UK and Australia should allow free movement for those with an offer of study or work says Senator James Paterson.

• Australia-UK free trade agreement should contain mutual recognition of standards and occupational qualifications.

• Base UK agreement on Australia’s existing CER and TTTA with New Zealand

• Should commit to a broader CANZUK deal between Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK.

• 80% more Brits live in CANZUK states than across the whole of the neighbouring EU. 1.2 million Brits live in Australia alone. 

• High support across all four states with recent polling showing majority support in New Zealand (82%) Canada (76%) and Australia (73%), with 68% support in the UK.

Senator James Paterson argues, in a new report released by the Adam Smith Institute today, that the UK and Australia should commit to removing barriers to working and living in each other’s countries as part of the ongoing Free Trade Agreement negotiations.

Australia will welcome the return of a global Britain, the senator says, noting that Australia and the UK share unparalleled historical, cultural, legal and familial ties dating back to 1788. These ties have been “strengthened through friendly rivalries on the sporting field and shared adversity on the battlefield.”

The Australian senator, writing for the think tank named after the British ‘apostle of free trade’ Adam Smith, says that the Australia-UK free trade agreement should contain mutual recognition of standards and occupations. Mutual recognition would allow goods to be sold in our respective countries regardless of differences in standards and regulations based on a presumption of trust and similar goals of safety and quality for consumers in each country. Recognition of qualifications would allow individuals to practice an equivalent occupation such as nursing or teaching without undertaking costly new exams or spending years acquiring duplicate qualifications.

Australia already has an agreement like this in place with its nearest neighbour. The free market think tank says that the forthcoming UK-Australia relationship should be modelled on the existing Australia-New Zealand agreements: the Closer Economic Relations (CER) agreement that provides a deep economic relationship through mutual recognition and the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement (TTTA) that provides the ability to work, live and study across the antipodean countries. The free market think tanks says that that the UK-Australia free trade agreement should allow Australian and UK citizens to easily obtain visas when they have job offers to match this existing liberal arrangement.

Australia is certainly a popular destination for Brits. In fact, the country has been the top destination for British citizens to migrate to for 40 of the past 43 years. At the time of the 2016 Census, there were over 1.2 million Australian residents born in the UK – almost 5 per cent of the Australian population. More Britons live down under than in the entirety of the EU. 

In return, there were 142,000 Australian-born residents in the UK in 2018, although the popularity of the UK as a destination for Australians has been in decline since extra visa fees, caps on employer sponsored visas, salary thresholds, more restrictions on unskilled migrant workers, and the NHS surcharge were introduced.As a result the number Australians allowed to stay in the UK indefinitely has declined markedly, falling by 71 per cent between 2013 and 2016.

The UK is currently Australia’s seventh largest two-way trading partner, with trade in goods and services of AU $30.3 billion. And as Australia’s second largest source of foreign investment, the UK contributes 18 per cent of Australia’s total foreign investment. A third of all Australian wine ends up in the UK market, making up one in five bottles sold in Britain.

Senator Paterson and the Adam Smith Institute say that by replicating the CER and Trans Tasman Mutual Recognition Arrangement for the future trading relationship with the UK could provide the basis for a broader CANZUK agreement in future involving the commonwealth countries of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the UK. The four modern diverse liberal democracies are united by a shared head of state, history, common values, and institutional ties of unparalleled strength.

Australia, New Zealand and Canada are all preparing to sign free trade agreements with the UK once the EU-transition period ends and the free market think tank says that the four developed-world liberal diverse modern democracies’ shared commitment to liberal values and the rules-based international order make them perfect candidates for a high-trust mutual recognition agreement. 

CANZUK has been growing in popularity in recent years across the four territories with it official policy of the opposition Canadian Conservatives, supported by New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters and the Opposition National Party, previously backed by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson (who spoke in praise of the idea at the launch of a paper at the Henry Jackson Society advocating the policy), and senior politicians like Senator Paterson in Australia. 

Polls have consistently shown the idea is very favourably received in each of the states, with a recent poll for CANZUK International (based in Canada) showing support is highest in New Zealand, with 82 per cent in favour of the proposal, Canada and

Australia follow with 76 per cent and 73 per cent support, and 68 per cent support the proposal in the UK. Over 300,000 people from the four states have signed a joint petition to encourage governments to commit to the idea. 

Senator James Paterson, and author of the report, said:

“The Australia-UK free trade agreement should eliminate barriers to trade like tariffs and quotas, and include generous provisions for visa-free travel. 

“But it should also provide the long term basis for stronger economic cooperation between like-minded nations in uncertain times. 

“Countries like Australia and the UK which share values and unmatched historical, legal and cultural ties can help secure each other’s freedom and prosperity by working closer together. 

“In the long term, a free trade, free movement block consisting of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK is an attractive idea in a dangerous world.”

Matt Kilcoyne, Deputy Director of the Adam Smith Institute, said:

"Four years after voting to the leave the EU, control of trade policy has returned to Britain. It’s only right that we use that power to bring down barriers with our closest friends. No matter the geographic distance, the links between the Australian and British peoples could not be closer. We have an historic chance to make it cheaper and easier to study, conduct business, and live our lives between our states. 

“Britain would do well to seize the chance to work with the modern diverse liberal democracies of Australia, Canada and New Zealand, to set a new global gold standard of trade deal based on high trust, mutual recognition and respect. 

Despite being separated by oceans we’re kith and kin, and we need an arrangement that recognises how close we really are."

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Matt Kilcoyne: matt@adamsmith.org | 07904 099599.

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.

Drop ARPA and think smarter, government urged

• The latest calls for state-funding of R&D are not visionary, but simply a repeat of a failed history

• State spending on research and development, in both the United States and

• Britain, does not contribute to innovation or economic growth

• £800m allocated to create British Advanced Research Projects Agency is a wasteful use of taxpayers’ money 

• The UK should look to the economies of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan’s economic miracles and encourage private sector Research & Development

• The UK Government is making a mistake by creating British ARPA.

New research by the Adam Smith Institute argues that this pursuit of a state-funded research body is a waste of taxpayer funds that will not stimulate innovation or substantial technological progress. 

Often reported as a personal preoccupation of senior government advisor Dominic Cummings, the creation of a British version of the USA’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) has been government policy since the Queen’s speech in 2019, in which she said the British government would:

“… significantly boost public R&D … modelled on the US Advanced Research Projects Agency …”

This followed a blog post a year earlier, on March 11, 2019, when Cummings said:

“We KNOW how effective the very unusual funding for computer science was in the 1960s/1970s—ARPA-PARC created the internet and personal computing …”

Terence Kealey, author of the report and emeritus professor of clinical biochemistry at the University of Buckingham in the United Kingdom, says that ARPA’s proponents misdiagnose the incentives that drive innovation and the history of the project in the United States. 

ARPA, along with other state-funded research spending, is justified by proponents through claims of a “market failure” in science funding: that private companies under produce “public good” basic science research. Yet the history of technological progress since the Industrial Revolution is one of private businesses investing in beneficial innovations without state assistance. 

Research from the OECD shows that public sector funding of R&D crowds out private funding and does not contribute to economic growth. While in the USA, the large scale public funding of research projects led to no long-term increase in per capita growth, and that US productivity actually declined.

Looking at the history of the American ARPA, and scientific progress in the USA before, during and after its foundation, the report argues that the original ARPA was a mistake and that the British government’s attempt to repeat it is ‘folly.’

Instead of copying a failed US model, the free market think tank argues that the UK should be looking to the far east for inspiration. South Korea, Taiwan and Japan’s embrace of a laissez-faire approach to R&D, funded by industry for its own interests, has meant high-tech companies growing quickly to challenge those in the industrialised west in recent decades. 

Business sector R&D spending in Japan and Taiwan stands at nearly two and half times that of the UK’s and South Korea’s is nearly three times as high as our own. 

Meanwhile nearly all of these countries’ research comes from private sources. 

Kealey argues that the eastern miracle economics enjoyed their status because their governments did not direct or fund research and that the latest calls for state-funding of R&D are not visionary, but simply a repeat of a failed history.

Terence Kealey, an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute in Washington DC, former lecturer in clinical biochemistry at Cambridge University and author of the report, said:

“In the hope of stimulating technological and economic growth, Parliament has committed £800 million to funding a British ARPA (Advanced Research Projects Agency). Yet the original American ARPA of 1958 failed to stimulate either technological or economic growth. Moreover it was, like our imitative ARPA, based on a discredited, Marxist, model of science. Every penny of our £800 million will be wasted.”

Matthew Lesh, Head of Research at the Adam Smith Institute, said:

“The evidence is clear: innovation is a bottom-up, spontaneous market-driven process. The so-called 'British ARPA' is throwing £800 million of taxpayer money down the drain. If we want our entrepreneurs and innovators to succeed we need to focus on reducing taxes and cutting red tape not on boondoggle vanity projects."

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Matt Kilcoyne: matt@adamsmith.org | 07904 099599

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.

Britain faces mental health crisis post-pandemic, novel psilocybin treatments needed

The Adam Smith Institute and the Conservative Drug Policy Reform Group call for a review of the Schedule 1 status of psilocybin in this new paper. 

Millions of Brits have endured social isolation, stressful working conditions, and lack of family contact, and other stressful or depression-inducing circumstances due to the ongoing pandemic, lockdown measures, and the associated economic crisis. Britain faces a mental health time bomb, says the free market think tank the Adam Smith Institute (ASI) and policy group the Conservative Drug Policy Reform Group (CDPRG). 

A new paper, co-released by the Adam Smith Institute and the Conservative Drugs Policy Reform Group and authored by leading researchers from King’s College London, and the University of Manchester, argues that the rescheduling of psilocybin, the active compound in magic mushrooms, could help avert a looming mental health crisis. 

The paper has been sent to the Home Office accompanied by statements of support from leading scientists. 

The Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001 deems psilocybin, along with many other potentially revolutionary medicines, harmful and lacking medical potential. This classification is erroneous, the scientists say. 

Crispin Blunt MP, who chairs CDRPG, says that this, coupled with the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, means a “cross-hatching of prohibitive scheduling” that “has led to a scientific blackout lasting nigh on fifty years, precluding new treatments and, with them, the prospect of a better life for millions of people.” 

Thousands of men and women from the armed forces, policing and front line medical staff are suffering from psychological injuries incurred through service to their country. The country has walked away from these brave individuals, the think tank warns as it calls for innovative new approaches. 

Psilocybin, the psychoactive compound in magic mushrooms, is found naturally in over 100 species of fungi. It induces temporary changes in mood, perception and cognition via activation of serotonin receptors in the brain. Although it is commonly seen as a recreational drug, a growing body of peer-reviewed academic research indicates that it  works well against treatment resistant depression. Depression affects an estimated 1.2 million adults in the UK and is a leading cause of suicide. 

This could not only improve the lives of those suffering this debilitating mental illness, but could also save the NHS billions and contribute substantially to the British economy. Mental illness costs the UK economy £94 billion per annum. Beyond the direct impacts on personal health, mental illnesses can reduce disposable income, financial security and workforce participation. Depression alone costs the UK an estimated £10bn a year from cost of treatment and lost employment. 

Together the researchers, CDPRG and the ASI propose the movement psilocybin to Schedule 2 of the Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001 on a research only model. They argue in the report that the rescheduling of psilocybin will reduce the current barriers to research, enabling the sorely needed exploration of fresh mental health treatments by the UK’s scientists. 

“Brits have faced months of isolation under lockdown and we’re only beginning to understand the consequences for not only our physical but also our mental health. Even before Covid-19, an estimated 1.2 million of us were battling against treatment-resistant depression. There hasn’t been a breakthrough in depression research for decades. By rescheduling psilocybin we have a chance to put Britain at the forefront of research, and change millions of lives for the better." 

(Dan Pryor, Head of Programmes, ASI)

Rescheduling psilocybin can reduce the absurdly high costs, extended research timelines and stigma that needlessly characterise the process of researching Schedule 1 substances with medicinal potential. Removing these barriers will equip the UK to develop world-leading mental health treatments that are more effective and more cost-effective than current responses, enabling the UK to fulfil its potential as a global centre of excellence in mental health and life sciences research. 

The authors argue that psilocybin’s current inclusion in Schedule 1 of the 2001 Regulations follows an outdated assumption of harmfulness, implicit in its Class A status, which is not supported by the current evidence base. Controlled drugs may be rescheduled by a Statutory Instrument implemented by the Home Secretary, on the advice of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD), without affecting existing legal controls on non-medical or scientific use, and there is a precedent for rescheduling controlled drugs before market authorization.

• Progress in the treatment of depression has been slow. Prior to the approval of esketamine by the European Commission in late 2019, the last major advancement in the treatment of depression came over 30 years ago with the licensing of SSRIs. 

• Psilocybin will fundamentally improve the treatment of mental health conditions. Psilocybin works in a different way to traditional antidepressants and psychological therapies, by directly increasing activity and changing patterns of connectivity in brain regions strongly associated with ongoing depression and anxiety. 

• Psilocybin’s current Schedule 1 status is at odds with its low toxicity. Compass Pathways recently completed the largest ever randomised study of psilocybin, in collaboration with Dr James Rucker and Professor Allan Young at King’s College London. The study found that psilocybin caused no statistically significant worsening of cognitive and emotional measures, no serious adverse events and no adverse events that led to withdrawal from the study. This is the strongest evidence yet for the basic safety profile of psilocybin, and the best evidence yet to justify ongoing, large scale research in patient populations. 

• Moving psilocybin to Schedule 2 could kick-start the UK’s flagging mental health research field. The UK presently has no active pharmaceutical laboratories doing central nervous system research and development outside of universities since Eli Lilly closed their site in Surrey in March 2020. 

Statements from the paper authors

Dr. James Rucker, Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist and Senior Clinical Lecturer in mood disorders and psychopharmacology at the Centre for Affective Disorders at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience at King’s College London and the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust.

“Major depression is common and deadly. It is associated with nearly half of all suicides in the UK and is a leading cause of disability and socioeconomic burden worldwide. About a third of people suffering with major depression don’t get better with standard drug and psychological treatments. Good quality, small scale clinical trials have indicated that psilocybin therapy is an effective new treatment for those people. 

We now need to perform large scale trials to confirm this. However, psilocybin is designated a ‘Schedule 1’ drug by the UK Government. This makes large scale clinical trials very difficult and very expensive to conduct. Schedule 1 designation is unnecessary because psilocybin is not dangerous and not addictive when compared to other drugs. Therefore, we are asking the UK Government to review the Schedule of psilocybin, so that we can work more efficiently to bring a potential new treatment to patients who are suffering, and dying, every day with major depression.”

David King, Director of Research at the Conservative Drug Policy Reform Group (CDPRG) and a final year graduate medical student at King's College London. (Corresponding Author) 

“There are more than a million depressed adults in the UK today whose illness does not get better with antidepressants. Almost one in three of these people will attempt suicide. My mother was one of them - she took her own life in 2013 after struggling with mental illness for decades. I speak from experience when I say that the impact on patients and their families is tremendous. 

Meanwhile, pharmaceutical interest in developing new drugs for depression has completely dried up - with one notable exception. Psilocybin-assisted therapies are being investigated, and the evidence suggests that they may work where other treatments have failed. One might think that the UK Government would be supporting this vital research however possible, but the opposite is true. 

Despite substantial evidence of safety, and with no known association between psilocybin and crime, it is controlled by UK law under the strictest possible regulations. While these regulations do not prohibit research, they make it far more difficult. Parliament has known about these barriers to research for 20 years, but no progress has been made. We cannot afford to wait any longer. The Government has an ethical duty to support mental health research by rescheduling psilocybin, urgently.”

Dr. Jesse Schnall, medical doctor in Melbourne, Australia, former visiting student, University of Oxford. 

“Every person deserves access to good healthcare. Rescheduling psilocybin is safe, effective and achievable today. When we discover a tool to help people who are suffering, we must use it. When the law no longer reflects the evidence, we must change it.”

Dr. Daniel D’Hotman, Australian Rhodes Scholar and medical doctor, currently completing a DPhil on the ethics and politics of using AI for suicide prevention at the University of Oxford.

“People with mental health issues deserve the same high quality care as any patient. But for some people, including many former service men and women with PTSD, all existing treatments fail. Psilocybin has shown great potential to help these patients. Yet its Schedule 1 status is holding back research. Rescheduling psilocybin would restore fairness to the regulatory environment, and give British scientists every chance of providing a new therapy that can reduce suffering for those who are in need."

Timmy Davis, Psilocybin Rescheduling Project Manager and researcher at the Conservative Drug Policy Reform Group (CDPRG) and is undertaking psychoanalytic training with the SITE for Contemporary Psychoanalysis. 

“Modern research is showing psilocybin to be a safe and effective psychiatric intervention, lending scientific credence to the voices of those who have espoused its psychotherapeutic properties for decades. Depression has been the target chosen to indicate its promise but psilocybin’s potential lies in its applicability across numerous clinical categories; a list including depression, post traumatic stress disorder, alcohol use disorder, nicotine addiction, obsessive compulsive disorder and anorexia nervosa is by no means exhaustive. While psilocybin remains in Schedule 1 these lines of research and others are unjustifiably stifled. The expedited rescheduling of psilocybin could save and improve numerous lives, alleviating the suffering of millions of individuals living with myriad mental health conditions, as well as furthering the UK’s reputation as leading the world in psychedelic research."

Prof. Jo Neill, Professor of Psychopharmacology in the Manchester Pharmacy School at the University of Manchester. 

“Psychedelic Medicine can provide an effective therapy for many hard to treat conditions, such as PTSD, refractory depression, addiction, and potentially many other disorders. More research is urgently required to enable our understanding of how these drugs work and how they can best be used for patient benefit. Current drug scheduling restrictions hinder this research, creating time delays, significant costs, and unnecessary bureaucracy. None of these restrictions applies to Schedule 2 drugs. Rescheduling will enable Psychedelics Research, and ensure that the UK’s Life Sciences sector becomes an international leader.”

To arrange interviews with Corresponding Author Dave King and with press enquiries for the Conservative Drug Policy Reform Group, please contact press@cdprg.co.uk

With press enquiries for the Adam Smith Institute, please contact matt@adamsmith.org (07904099599)

Ad ban plan won't help Britain battle the bulge

After news was released of Boris Johnson planning to ban ads for Britain’s favourite foods on telly and online, Daniel Pryor takes to task the idea that it will help Britain battle the bulge:

"Politicians might find TV ads annoying, but the revenues they generate help fund our favourite shows. Banning junk food ads before watershed would give us worse TV and do nothing to improve the nation's health. A large body of evidence shows that advertising doesn't brainwash us into buying things we don't want. Instead it works by boosting specific brands, like encouraging people who fancy a takeaway to choose Wagamama over Nando's. Since there's no legal definition of junk food, the proposed ban would include virtually all fruit juice, raisins, hummus, most cheeses and more. Public health nannies might want to treat us all like brainwashed children, but we should reject them and their half-baked nonsense."

For further comment or to arrange an interview, please contact Matt Kilcoyne on 07904099599 or email matt@adamsmith.org

Giving a stamp of approval to a good tax cut

The Adam Smith Institute has cautiously welcomed most of Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s summer statement. Matthew Lesh, Head of Research, said:

"Stamp duty is Britain’s worst tax. The cut is the right move to get Britain moving. Temporary measures to get young people work experience, to build inwork skills, are also welcome in the face of an increasing minimum wage.

“Furlough continues for a few more months but reality will hit eventually. In the forthcoming Budget, the Chancellor should cut the cost of hiring by permanently reducing the burden of employers’ national insurance, remove red tape like occupational licenses, and abolish the factory tax to get businesses investing in their futures.

“The stimulus proposals are very questionable. The VAT cut and subsidising restaurants will be expensive and provide limited benefit. People aren’t spending on food, accomodation and attractions because of safety concerns, not lack of demand or cash.” 

To arrange an interview, or further comment please contact Matt Kilcoyne on 07904099599 or email matt@adamsmith.org

Real New Deal is Boris' Promise of Planning Reform

Despite worrying news of an interventionist ‘New Deal’ for the country, the best noises from the Prime Minister Boris Johnson in his speech in Dudley today come in the detail of promised planning reform. Much of which builds on suggestions the ASI has made in recent months and years — including the great research work done by London YIMBY’s John Myers. Matt Kilcoyne, Deputy Director of the Adam Smith Institute, gives the following comment:

"Usually you trail your best lines, but the Prime Minister's best bit is yet to come: promised planning reform is the real new deal. Homeowners will be able to build up via a fast track approval process and neighbours' consent; commercial and residential properties will be able to switch purpose without hindrance; and the developers will get the ability to demolish old stores to get people living on our high streets. This is a plan to build up, rebuild, and repurpose. 

"If Boris delivers this reform package we could finally build homes in the places people want to live, transform our forgotten towns and cities into living metropolises, and help tradesmen bounce Britain back to growth after this viral shock."

For further comment please contact Matt via 07904099599 or email matt@adamsmith.org

The protectionist commission Adam Smith warned about

Following the Government’s announcement of a Trade and Agricultural Commission our Matt Kilcoyne says:

“In response to the actually unacceptable news of a commission being set up to restrict the scope of trade talks in response to lobbying efforts by the NFU, please find a bit of perfect Adam Smith who dealt with this kind of nonsense in 1776.

‘People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

‘It is impossible indeed to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies; much less to render them necessary.’

This commission is a kick in the teeth for consumers and it is a conspiracy by a powerful few against the public good.”

To arrange an interview or further comment please contact Matt Kilcoyne on 07904099599 or via email matt@adamsmith.org

Lockdown Independence Day is a cause for celebration

Our Matthew Kilcoyne welcomes the Prime Minister’s announcements to reopen the UK economy’s lockdown as the viral threat recedes.

"Britain’s Lockdown Independence Day will be the 4th of July and that is a cause for celebration. While caution has been prudent in the face of a viral threat, we cannot exist in a state of government-imposed stasis forever. 

"Common sense solutions previously mooted now need to come into effect: allowing any pub to operate outdoors, use their car parks as beer gardens for punters, and even use local parks as part of their backyard. Cafes and restaurants must be able to turn high streets into living streets with outdoor seating.

"These are the first of many steps the Government should take to ensure that our retail and services sectors thrive. It should come with the withdrawal of support for businesses that can stand on their own feet. But those that still face government restriction on raising revenue deserve support while the virus continues to disrupt our lives."  

To arrange an interview or further comment please contac Matt Kilcoyne on 07904099599 or via email matt@adamsmith.org