The Guardian article includes a link to the Home Office Report as a .pdf file. The study gives estimates of the number of people involved in the trade and is based on interviews with "222 convicted high-level dealers".
In case the article is moved, the report can be downloaded directly here (pdf).
There are other reports that have recently come from the Home Office, according to the Guardian, and ACPO is about to hold its annual drug conference, so the newspapers will have quite a few stories over the next few days.
20 November 2007
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2 comments:
From the report: "the research team adopted a purposive sampling methodology designed to
identify high-level drug dealers" and "The purposive sampling approach means that it is not possible to infer beyond the sample to the wider population of drugs suppliers. However, even if a random sampling methodology were used it would not be possible to make statistical generalisations about active drug markets, as the population from which the sample was drawn only included dealers who had been caught."
The researchers nicely admit this flaw though in the section 'Implications' in the report no word is mentioned on this. As on average only 10% of drug traffic is intercepted by police, the value of the 'implications' appears to be highly debatable.
I have allowed this anonymous comment, because it has something important to say about methodological issues. It would be nice to know who is making the comments for future reference, although I am not yet making any policy here!
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