The four months since the UK’s first legal drug consumption room opened in Glasgow have been plagued by littered paraphernalia and rising crime rates, according to locals. The Thistle Centre in Glasgow became the first place in the UK where users could take class A drugs without prosecution when it opened in January. The facility, modelled on existing sites elsewhere in Europe, does not supply or test the drugs taken on its premises, but provides on-hand medical help during injections and overdoses.

Critics warned that the consumption room – designed to encourage “safer” drug use – would encourage people to take dangerous substances, and residents in the city’s east Calton area said they have seen a sharp rise in drug dealing, discarded paraphernalia and anti-social behaviour since it opened. Colin McGowan said he had collected 50 used needles from a street near the centre and found a further 200 in a Morrisons car park opposite the consumption room.

Fellow campaigner Annemarie Ward told STV News that the three-year pilot was an examle of “a failed policy and a failed response”, warning against plans to open further centres across the UK.

She said the new site, aimed at tackling Glasgow’s sky-high rate of drug consumption, had in fact had the opposite effect. “We’re being gaslit,” she said. “We’ve been … told this has been a crisis since 2019, but I don’t see a crisis response.”

“It’s incredibly frustrating and really, really sad,” Ms Ward added. “To listen to people say their community has been devastated by the drug consumption room – not wanting to walk their dog at night, go out alone, the mess, the paraphernalia, the crime rates going up.

“This is all the stuff that we warned the Scottish government about.”

Other residents, Vanessa Paton and Angela Scott, said living in Calton now felt like being in a “war zone”.

“We ourselves have seen the increase in the drug paraphernalia, the needles being left discarded,” they added.

Police Scotland said it was aware of “long-standing issues” in the area, adding that it was committed to “reducing the harm associated with problematic substance use and addiction … within the confines of the law”.

Glasgow City Council’s addiction services convener Allan Casey said the local authority wasn’t aware of an increase in publicly discarded needles and suggested that police hadn’t disclosed an increase in drug-related crime.

Scotland’s Health Secretary Neil Gray said: “Almost 250 people have used The Thistle since it opened in mid-January, with around 2000 injecting episodes – helping to protect people against blood-borne viruses and taking used needles off the streets, ensuring they’re safely disposed of within the service.

“I recognise local people’s concerns and Glasgow partners are addressing them through outreach work, ongoing needle uplift operations, and plans to expand public needle disposal bins. [The] Glasgow Health and Social Care partnership will continue to engage with the local community and a comprehensive individual evaluation will examine the service’s impact.”