THE former Director General of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency, Graeme Pearson, has spoken of the devastation wreaked by drugs in Glasgow.
Mr Pearson was in the city's drugs squad in the 1970s and is now a Scottish Labour MSP and the party's justice spokesman.
He said: "I look at Glasgow and it looks a better city than it did 20 or 30 years ago. When drugs first hit it was like an atomic bomb.
"But drug addicts are still shooting up in the centre of Glasgow, in 21st century Scotland, and it's outrageous that this kind of thing is still going on."
Mr Pearson said the purity levels of drugs sold in the west of Scotland is far lower than south of the border.
He explained: "They're that greedy they cut it to bits. So you're getting heroin and cocaine that can have 7% purity.
"The price has remained stable, whatever the commodity is, you just cut the purity.
"If you're down in England you're hoping for purity values of beyond 20%, sometimes as much as 40%.
"In Scotland you're lucky if you get out of single percentage figures.
"Elsewhere they wouldn't even buy that kind of stuff. They wouldn't demean themselves by using that quality."
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