Huddled on a street corner, a young man in a blue jacket openly and shamelessly smokes crack cocaine from a pipe before staggering away with his friend.
The incredible scene was photographed by the Daily Mail at the back of a city centre McDonald’s in Dundee which has been tarnished with a grim reputation over its levels of poverty, drug use and violent crime in recent years.
Scotland’s fourth largest city was in the spotlight again this week when it emerged that Salvation Army worker Charles Mackie, 56, had been sacked after criticising the growing number of migrants taking up accommodation used for Dundee’s homeless.
Mr Mackie lost his claim for unfair dismissal at an employment tribunal which ruled that his sacking from the charity’s Strathmore Lodge hostel in the city was justified, despite his insistence that he was not racist.
It followed the case of a Romanian grooming gang which was recently jailed for a total of 74 years for raping and sexually exploiting ten vulnerable women after giving them crack cocaine.
The Daily Mail visited Dundee and found that brazen displays of drug taking were far from unusual in the city which is famed for its fruit and nut Dundee cake, but has been recently ravaged by crime and rampant drug misuse.
Dundee was known during its prosperous past for ‘jute, jam and journalism’ due to its mills producing the fibre material, the Keiller’s marmalade factory and the offices of DC Thomson which published newspapers, magazines and the comics Beano and Dandy.
Many suggest its decline began early in the last century when its jute industry moved to Calcutta. The Keiller’s factory which produced a range of preserves and sweets closed in 1992 and the city’s publishing house has shrunk in size in recent years.
Two men meet to take drugs in an area known as ‘Crack Alley’ outside the Keiller Centre in Dundee
The Keiller Centre, a largely empty shopping centre in the centre of the city, has become a magnet for drug users in the areaÂ
Huddled on a street corner, a young man in a blue jacket openly and shamelessly smokes crack cocaine from a pipe before staggering away with his friend
Numerous locals complained to the Daily Mail about open Class A drug dealing in the city centre which is also blighted by shoplifters and many stores going out of business.
Some have started to at least in part blame the SNP for failing to tackle the plight of the city – and say the party has been distracted from real-world problems by its woke agenda.
Dundee is an SNP stronghold and has been nicknamed ‘Yes City’ because it has backed the party so consistently on the question of Scottish independence.
All three of the city’s MPs hail from the party and the council has had an SNP leader since 2009 with either an overall majority or leading a minority coalition for the last 13 years.
But the party – both locally and nationally – has been repeatedly accused of putting its interest in wokery ahead of more pressing concerns like the economy.
While the council is facing a budget deficit of £25 million for the current tax year, it also recently emerged that Dundee is one of the biggest spenders in Scotland on DEI policies.
It had spent over £1 million on pay and training to increase ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ – policies that are central to woke local government.
Addressing DEI spending Scottish Conservative deputy leader Rachael Hamilton said: ‘This is yet another example of the SNP prioritising ideological projects over the issues that people actually care about. It’s no wonder Scots are fed up with Left-wing politicians at Holyrood.’
A man in a blue puffer coat carries his crack pipe outside the Keiller Centre
Data from October 2025 found homelessness applications in Dundee had risen by 18 per cent in a yearÂ
Salvation Army worker Charles Markie, 56, (pictured) was sacked after saying migrants should be sent back home ‘on a f***ing boat’ but insists he is not racist
Mr Mackie believes the number of migrants in the city has hampered efforts to help tackle Dundee’s long standing homeless issue
Scottish Conservative leader Russell Findlay also stated last year that the SNP has turned Scotland into a ‘laboratory for weird and wacky policies’.
Mr Findlay added: ‘For the SNP, no policy can be too harmful, half-baked or unhinged. From rent controls, to a universal basic income, to a four-day working week, if it’s woke, they want it.’
While millions of pounds has been spent on developing Dundee’s quayside and opening a new V & A design museum, many say that not enough is being done to tackle drugs and crime.
Ric May, 58, who runs a Christian project called Jesus Dugs to train dogs to provide comfort and help the mental health of drug addicts, said: ‘Drugs here are out of control.
‘We have so many women dying from pneumonia after using crack cocaine, often mixed with prescription drugs or so-called street valium.
‘The city is littered with drug addicts, alcoholics and people with mental health problems. They go shoplifting to pay for their habits and it has led to a huge number of shops closing in the last three years or so.
‘There are security guards in most shops and they are under a lot of pressure. People just go in and grab rails of stuff and run off so they can sell things to get their next hit.
‘Crack cocaine seems to have replaced heroin in the last few years, and I have even seen it being smoking by people sitting in Greggs without anyone else noticing.’
Ric May, 58, (pictured) who runs a Christian project called Jesus Dugs to train dogs to provide comfort and help the mental health of drug addicts, said: ‘Drugs here are out of control’
Mr May said he had noticed street-level drug dealers becoming younger with some being teenagers aged just 14 or 15 and referred to by local addicts as ‘the young team’.Â
He said: ‘They came to Greggs to rob the place and attack staff when I was in there two-years-ago. I put one in a headlock, and we got them out, so staff could lock the door. They were trying to force their way back in. The police were called, but they didn’t do anything.’
Mr May said he had also come across cases of ‘cuckooing’ where gangs take over the home of a vulnerable person to use as a base for drug dealing.
Victims of the practice included one of his friends, an ex-lawyer with mental health issues, who had four microwaves installed in his flat by a gang to make crack.
The current estimated unemployment rate in Dundee of 5.3% is far ahead of the Scottish average of 3.6% and the 4.1% across the whole of the UK, although there are other areas with higher numbers.
But the city has the second-highest rate of crime in Scotland with 783 reported crimes per 10,000 people in 2024/25, only beaten by Glasgow which had 829.
Dundee has also frequently had the highest rate of non-sexual violent crime in Scotland in recent years with an annual average of nearly 36 incidents of homicide, attempted murder, serious assault, and abuse for every 10,000 people between April 2021 and June 2023.
This was higher than nearest rivals Glasgow and Aberdeen, which respectively had an annual average of just over 27 and 26 of the serious crimes per 10,000 of population in the same period.
One of the only businesses remaining in the centre is a shoe repair and key cutting stall run for the last 45 years by Robert Lawrence, 70, (pictured)
The main shopping streets in Dundee feature a number of alleyways in between buildings, referred to in Scotland as ‘pends’ which are often used for drug taking and dealing.
One covered alley off the High Street, called New Inn Entry, is now known locally as Crack Alley because of its illicit use as a drug den.
The Daily Mail witnessed two men with drawn and hollow faces, and a blonde woman, smoking crack cocaine in a doorway in the alley behind Bayne’s family bakery. The group refused to talk to a reporter as they stumbled back into the High Street after their hit.
It was down the same alley that the Mail later witnessed the man smoking crack cocaine from a pipe, alongside a friend who also seemed unsteady on his feet.
The pair ignored the presence of CCTV cameras, and delivery drivers from Deliveroo and Just Eat who were waiting nearby to pick up takeaways.
The squalid scene took place outside the side entrance to the Keiller Centre shopping mall which opened in 1979 and has become largely empty in a dramatic illustration of Dundee’s decline.
With the majority of shops shuttered-up, the centre has tried to re-invent itself as an arts and culture hub, staging the Dundee fringe festival for the last three years, with last year’s event featuring 100 acts over ten days in four store units.
One of the only businesses remaining in the centre is a shoe repair and key cutting stall run for the last 45 years by Robert Lawrence, 70, who wants to carry on working as long as possible, despite plans to demolish the centre and build student accommodation in its place.
A couple smoking down an alley off Murraygate in central Dundee’s shopping area
With no sign of any customers around, Mr Lawrence admitted: ‘Business is bad. The building here is in a bad way with doors broken and blocked off, so a lot of people think the whole place is closed.
‘Drugs are a real problem. You get people dealing on the street or selling stolen goods, and it puts off visitors from coming into the city centre.
‘Part of the problem is that the council has spent so much money on the waterfront and nothing on the high street. My opinion is that the waterfront isn’t there for Dundee people. It’s for tourists.’
Meanwhile, there were no police officers visible as a reporter witnessed a pensioner on a mobility scooter appearing to sell cartons of contraband cigarettes from a box close to the giant statue of Dandy cartoon character Desperate Dan on the edge of Dundee’s City Square.
On the adjoining High Street, shopper Kenny McPherson, 67, said: ‘Drugs are rife. I see cops standing there doing nothing, and just watching, while people are dealing almost next to them. The town is empty. People are scared to come in.
‘Druggies are always fighting with each other and rolling around in the street. A couple of months ago, there were two women brawling just here, and the police just let them go. If it had been you or me, we would be locked up.
‘The SNP control the local council and they have the place covered in cameras so they must know what is going on, but nothing seems to happen.
‘We used to have two wardens patrolling around, and they did a brilliant job reporting things to the police and keeping an eye on what is happening, but they retired in May and they have not been replaced.’
High street shopper Kenny McPherson, 67, said drugs were ‘rife’ in Dundee: ‘I see cops standing there doing nothing, and just watching, while people are dealing almost next to them. The town is empty. People are scared to come in’
Retired offshore worker John Todd, 70, added: ‘It’s definitely got worse. The drugs are all over the place. They are selling drugs on corners everywhere and the police are nowhere to be seen.’
A 16-year-old girl who asked not to be named said: ‘This place is a s**** hole. There is nothing here. It’s full of junkies. There are needles lying on the floor and most places smell like p*** because of people urinating everywhere. You can’t even sit down without hearing people screaming or yelling.’
Margaret Cameron, 74, said: ‘The place is horrible now. Dundee used to be lovely to visit on a day out, but now half the shops are gone. It’s like a ghost town. It’s all charity shops, and hardly anything else.
‘When I was a girl, my granny used to live down here and we would walk to the old market where we would get fresh eggs, fresh chicken and everything. Now that is all gone, and you just see a lot of young people on drugs which is no good. There just aren’t the jobs around.Â
‘Young people are sitting around with no purpose. I feel sorry for them. I would never come out at night because I just wouldn’t feel safe. It’s a damn shame.’
Margaret Cameron, 74, said: ‘The place is horrible now. Dundee used to be lovely to visit on a day out, but now half the shops are gone. It’s like a ghost town. It’s all charity shops, and hardly anything else’
Salvation Army worker Mr Mackie was sacked in March 2024, despite working for the Salvation Army for nearly 20 years, after fellow staff were shocked by his comments about sending migrants home.
He was alleged to have told colleagues at the Strathmore Lodge hostel: ‘There wouldn’t be a housing shortage if we weren’t taking in 150 refugees,’ and ‘send them all back on a f****** boat’.
Speaking after he lost his unfair dismissal case, Mr Mackie said he had merely been concerned about how the number of migrants in the city had hampered efforts to help tackle Dundee’s long-standing homeless issue.
He said: ‘When I first started the people were predominantly from Dundee. Around seven years ago we started to get more Polish or African people through the door for various reasons.
‘I would treat all people equally, 100 per cent. Initially we weren’t really affected by migrants who’d come via boats. We’d get the odd person and we’d always take them in and support them to get into housing.
‘But over the last couple of years it has got worse and we’ve taken in more and more. I had nothing against that at all, as long as we had somewhere for them to go.’
Dundee has seen around 1,000 refugees or migrants settle in the city in the past five years including more than 500 Ukrainians arriving between 2022 and 2024, according to Dundee City Council Figures.
Around 250 nationals from Syria, Iraq and other troubled countries have arrived as part of resettlement schemes since 2020.
Mr Markie whose job involved supporting homeless and vulnerable people including refugees, said: ‘I’ve supported hundreds of foreign residents over 20 years. Not once was my behaviour towards them ever taken into question.
‘It was stated in the tribunal that it didn’t make a difference to me what nationality someone was.’
A Romanian grooming gang of four men and a woman were jailed at the High Court in Glasgow last October for raping and sexually abusing women in flats across Dundee, and forcing at least one into prostitution, after plying them with drugs
Ringleader Marian Cumpanasoiu, 38 who was described as a ‘winking, smirking pimp’ was given a 24-year extended sentence while Cristian Urlateanu, 41, was jailed for 20 years, Remus Stan, 35, for 12 years, Catalin Dobre, 45, for ten years and Alexandra Bugonea, 35, for eight years.
Judge Lord Scott told them they had manipulated the women by giving them an ‘unending supply of mostly free crack cocaine’ while assuming that their victims’ drug-related lifestyles meant they would never be detected or reported.
The gang used a string of squalid flats as brothels and sex dens including one in a drab-looking tenement block in Park Avenue in the drugs-blighted Stobswell area to the east of the city centre
Former heroin addict Alan McMulkin, 56, who was on his way to get his methadone prescription from a nearby medical centre said he had no idea that the brothel had been operating in the street.
He said: ‘Dundee is getting worse. Drug addicts on crack cocaine are taking over. People are smoking it all day and night with 0.1gm costing £10 a time. They can go all through their benefits in one night, spending up to £600, and have to thieve from shops to pay for it.’
Former addict Alan McMulkin (pictured) said ‘drug addicts on crack cocaine are taking over’ the Scottish city
Another local resident Sean Boyd, 46, told how he had spent 12 months in hospital after being attacked with a scaffolding pole when he tried to stop two people openly drug dealing in the street.
He showed a reporter an ugly scar on his head wound from the attack which also left him with nerve damage and still limping from a leg injury, meaning he is no longer able to run his landscaping business.
Mr Boyd pointed to the former ground floor flat of an elderly woman in the tenement opposite the building containing the brothel, saying: ‘She was robbed nearly every day by addicts taking her pension money.
‘Eventually she had to go into a nursing home, but even then people were still going into her home and using it as a drugs den.’
A retired PA at the University of Dundee who only wanted to be known as Maureen, 77, told how problems in the city had escalated since she bought her home in the area in 1980 after living in New York for ten years.
She said: ‘When I moved here, the big problem was only dog poo on the streets. Neighbours were friendly, and we had parties every year, and were in and out of each other’s houses. Now the streets are dirtier and there is litter everywhere.
‘You can smell the marijuana in quite a few places and you just have to accept it. There is nothing you can do because it is more or less legal now. I want to say something positive, but I can’t. If I had the money, I would move out.’
But the area around Park Avenue was defended by others including former boat painter Ian Buchan, 62, who has been on disability benefits since having a heart attack in 2017.
Mr Buchan said: ‘This isn’t the greatest of places, but it’s not too bad. It’s a lot better than Peterhead where I used to live. Peterhead was a great place in the 70s and 80s, but it’s a dump now.’
Umair Rasheed, 27, the Pakistani-born manager of the Booze 4 U store on the corner of Park Avenue appeared unfazed when a woman staggered into his shop to buy a can of super-strength lager as soon as she was legally allowed to do so at 10am.
He said: ‘The area is fine. People are nice and everyone is friendly. I don’t get any trouble, although people come in and ask for a £5 cigarette. It means they want a packet of fake cigarettes, but we don’t sell them. We only have legal cigarettes from the cash and carry.’
Umair Rasheed, 27, the Pakistani-born manager of the Booze 4 U store said the area was friendly – although some customers do ask if he stocks knock-off cigarettes
Scotland’s Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service released pictures after Cumpanasoiu was jailed showing the brothel he operated in Bright Street in the Lochee area, just yards away from a Baptist church and a Boy’s Brigade meeting hall.
One image featured a stained double bed in a sparse room while others showed shelves of drug paraphernalia, including novelty bongs and a dirty living room area with plastic bottles on the floor and filthy carpets.
Neighbourhood shops at the end of the road include a Poundstretchers, a Cash Converters pawnbrokers, two vape shops, a tanning salon and a Polish supermarket.
Lila Laja, 56, who is from Poland and was visiting the supermarket with her daughter Kamila, 27, and grandson Daniel, three, said: ‘We have lived in Dundee for 17 years and we like it, but the town centre is not looking very good. It is very sad. Every single day we see people taking drugs.’
Another flat used by the Romanian gang was in more affluent Perth Road which has a range of independent shops, restaurants and cafes.
Jonathan Sewart, 44, the licenses of the Speedwell bar close to the flat said he had no idea that anything untoward had been going on there, but described the grooming case as ‘terrible and horrendous’.
He said: ‘This is a great neighbourhood with a mixture of locals, students and people who come here to work. If you go back ten years, there were a lot of ‘to let’ signs going up in the road, but more businesses are opening now.
‘This area has definitely picked up and is more busy than it was. There are lots of visitors and tourists. You get crime everywhere, but I don’t think this is worse than anywhere else.’
But others are not so optimistic, including a person who recently posted in Reddit that they had moved to Dundee from Yorkshire two months earlier ‘for NHS work’, but now wanted to leave.
Their post stated: ‘I feel like we’re reaching a depression point having only been here for few weeks. The city feels like a ghost town. Boarded up shops packed with tired looking people and zombies (drug addicts) harassing them for change in every corner.’
The poster also criticised ‘exorbitant parking charges’ and Dundee’s Low Emissions Zone, which it has in common with other Scottish cities, banning certain high-polluting vehicles from city centre streets.
They added: ‘A low emissions zone would make sense in a global metropolis, but Dundee is far from one. Outside of the city centre, many run-down neighbourhoods and empty boarded-up buildings.
‘Reminds me of some post-industrial Eastern European cities back in the 90s. Overall feels like the edge of the UK, poor, neglected, with damaging Council policies for local businesses and residents.
‘We’ve tried to make it here, but we’ve reached the point where we’ve actually started looking for a way out. Most likely we’ll be moving back to England next year. I know towns in England suffer from dying high streets too, we’ve lived in a few, but never seen anything like Dundee. So my question is, why is Dundee such a run down city?’
The post attracted mixed replies with one person explaining Dundee’s decline, saying: ‘Unjustifiably high rents for shops, lack of disposable income, and it’s the drug death capital of Europe. Crime is very high too and it’s increasing steadily. I loved Dundee up until the early 2000s.’
Another added: ‘Moved here three years ago and in that time I’ve seen it get significantly worse… Not really sure what caused it other than people not having as much money?’
However, a 55-year-old mother who was walking in the street opposite another flat used by the grooming gang in Gellatly Street said: ‘There is a lot of poverty here and the availability of drugs is increasing.
‘But it’s a nice city and very friendly. There are folk who work really hard and volunteer to make their communities the best they can be. People call it Scumdee or Dumbdee, but it is really unfair.’
A local social media group called ‘The People’s Voice Against Dundee City Council’ has hundreds of members who regularly share scathing observations about their rundown city.
In one post last October, a woman living in social housing complained the council has taken two years to replace flooring the previous owner had allowed to become soaked in dog urine.