What do your students need to know about spiking?

In the first King’s speech of the new Labour government, spiking became a standalone offence in its own right.

Before this change, the offence could be tried as assault or as part of the Offences Against the Person Act. The new approach aims to offer clarity, easier reporting and stricter penalties. But will it make any difference?

A couple of years ago, I was lucky enough to spend a week in Cracow, and in the early morning, before it got too warm, I usually went for a run. The previous night’s revellers were making their way to bed, sitting on park benches, sometimes still with a bottle of beer in hand or falling asleep. One morning, I passed a young woman being held up by a few young men. Her legs were collapsing beneath her, and despite her small stature they were struggling to keep her upright. At the time, I remember being surprised at how drunk this young woman was, but at least she had friends looking after her.

Shortly afterwards, a frightening new trend appeared to emerge with an increase in the number of mainly young women having their drinks spiked or even being injected with drugs in nightclubs and bars up and down the UK. My daughters and several of their friends have been victims. Fortunately, my elder daughter’s friends noticed that a man standing beside her at a bar had put something in her drink and were able to warn her before she drank more than a couple of sips. Security was alerted; apparently, he was ‘known’ to staff but had disappeared before any action could be taken to identify him. Whatever was put into the drink resulted in loss of coordination, but fortunately, she was brought safely home by friends and suffered no ill effects.

Her sister had a more traumatic experience as a first-year university student when she was injected with drugs at a nightclub. She rarely drinks alcohol, so she immediately knew something was wrong, although she didn’t feel the injection. Her arm became painful, and she quickly could not coordinate her legs. The situation was reported to medically trained security staff at the nightclub. However, there was a degree of scepticism, with some staff believing that she had had too much to drink. Fortunately, the puncture mark on the back of her arm was quickly located and advised her of what needed to happen next. A visit to A&E confirmed she had been injected with ketamine, MDMA and traces of other drugs. Fortunately, screening also confirmed she had not contracted any blood-borne viruses.

My daughters were fortunate to have friends who could support and help them, and neither has suffered any lasting effects. However, not all young women are so lucky.

The most natural question for us all is ‘what can we do about this?’ and there have already been organised boycotts of nightclubs across the country, advice was given to young people on staying safe, but short of wearing chainmail and using a hermetically sealed cup to drink from there is no foolproof solution other than not going out at all.

Chameleon PDE schools can access personal safety lesson for 16 to 18-year-olds that include advice and issues to consider when socialising.

Avoiding being spiked isn’t easy no matter the efforts in place to ensure safety – but like everything else, raising awareness and having more people vigilant to this type of behaviour may make it more challenging to carry out, and to this end, we would urge you to talk to your students, children, friends, and family. Given the apparent prevalence of this behaviour, we also wonder if it is sometimes more prank-based than sexually motivated. Nonetheless, it is inexcusable and irresponsible and could ultimately result in murder if the cocktail of drugs used kills someone.

It’s also important not to vilify men, most of whom would never dream of carrying out this behaviour. Instead, let’s encourage them to support women in staying safe and challenge their peers' unhelpful views and behaviour.

Perhaps education, discussion, respect and agreed responsibility for each other when partying is more likely to be protective than changes to legislation, particularly given the difficulties in identifying perpetrators and already stretched police forces being able to investigate.

Going back to the intoxicated young woman in Cracow – I hope she was ‘just’ drunk and being helped home by considerate friends, but can we be sure?