People caught in possession of drugs who are diverted into treatment and education programmes rather than prosecuted are a third less likely to reoffend, according to a major new study examining outcomes across 13 English police forces over four years.
The research, described as the first of its kind, examined more than 62,000 criminal incidents involving people contacted by police between October 2021 and September 2022, tracking outcomes over the following four years. It found that those whose cases were handled through police-led diversion schemes — which steer individuals away from the criminal justice system and into treatment and education services — were significantly less likely to reoffend than comparable individuals who were prosecuted for drug possession.
Professor Alex Stevens, acting director of the University of Sheffield’s Centre for Criminological Research, who led the study, said the findings should give police forces across the country confidence to act. “The evidence is now strong enough that all police forces can be confident in adopting and expanding diversion schemes for people caught in possession of drugs,” he said. The research was funded by the Cabinet Office’s evaluation accelerator fund, and the team is now working with the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing to support wider adoption of police-led drug diversion across England.
A number of forces, including Durham, the West Midlands and Thames Valley, already operate formal diversion schemes for those caught in possession of drugs. However, many forces continue to take an officially law-and-order approach to drug possession even where prison sentences for simple possession are now rare in practice. Commander Alison Heydari, the NPCC lead for out-of-court resolutions, said the study underscored the value of the approach. “Through the ‘national OOCR strategy’, there is a clear commitment to ensuring that eligible individuals are consistently offered appropriate alternatives to prosecution, helping to prevent reoffending while also addressing disparities in outcomes,” she said.
Despite the positive findings, the researchers found that diversion was being significantly underused, even within forces that already operate established schemes, with only a minority of eligible cases actually diverted because officers chose not to use the option available to them. “Police forces now have an opportunity to reduce their costs — and pressure on the courts — by making more use of diversion,” said Stevens, who resigned from the government’s expert advisory council on drugs in 2019 over what he described as the “political vetting” of candidates. “This will require clear leadership, proper training, and a shift in culture at street level.”
Jason Kew, a former detective chief inspector at Thames Valley Police who led the development of its pre-arrest drug diversion scheme and is now a senior practice specialist at the Centre for Justice Innovation, said forces with embedded schemes could go further by developing specialist pathways for women. “Getting this right means fewer women in custody, fewer children lost to the system — and stronger, healthier communities,” he said. “The question is no longer whether diversion works. It is how boldly we choose to build on it.”
The study also identified significant disparities in how diversion is applied. People living in the most deprived neighbourhoods were found to be the most heavily policed and least likely to be diverted, while black people were less likely to be diverted than white people for similar offences. Professor Kojo Koram of Loughborough University’s law school, author of The Next Fix: The Winners and Losers in the Future of Drugs, said: “For every stage of the drug policing process, from stop and search, to arrest, to sentencing, statistics show that black and minority ethnic people are punished at a much higher rate than white people despite similar rates of use. Diversion schemes are a first step towards moving people away from criminalisation, and clearly needed when we look at our overcrowded prisons, but they are still quite a tame policy initiative when compared to full decriminalisation and legal regulation policies being passed across Europe and North America. Britain remains desperately behind the curve on drug policy.”
The findings echo concerns first raised by the Home Office itself in 2017, around the time diversion schemes were initially being formally adopted, when a government report acknowledged: “There is, in general, a lack of robust evidence as to whether capture and punishment serves as a deterrent for drug use.” Steve Rolles, senior policy analyst at the Transform Drug Policy Foundation, argued the approach still falls short of what is needed. “Diversion still feels like the government wanting to have the benefits of decriminalisation without having to say the word,” he said. “Despite the obvious benefits of decriminalisation, it does nothing to deal with the harms of the illegal trade. The choice is between putting the government in charge, or leaving organised crime in control.”
