Scotland’s latest drug death figures are horrific, with 1,133 people losing their lives in 2025, an increase of 116 on the previous year.

And almost immediately, the political battle began over who should carry the blame.

The Scottish Conservatives pointed firmly towards the SNP Government, with leader Russell Findlay accusing John Swinney of pursuing a failed approach and demanding greater emphasis on rehabilitation.

The Liberal Democrats also turned their fire on the SNP, although their proposed solution is markedly different, with calls for more safer drug consumption facilities, drug checking and better access to rehabilitation.

The Scottish Greens have meanwhile attacked cuts to drug treatment services in Glasgow, arguing that reducing frontline support while deaths are increasing will put vulnerable people at greater risk.

There is plenty of legitimate scrutiny for a Scottish Government which has been responsible for health and drug treatment policy for almost two decades, but the suggestion that nothing has been done does not withstand examination.

The National Mission on Drugs has received an additional £250 million since 2021, including £100 million for residential rehabilitation, while Scotland has also introduced harm reduction measures and expanded treatment and recovery programmes.

Whether those policies have worked well enough is another question entirely, and 1,133 deaths provide a devastating reason to ask it.

But there is another uncomfortable fact in this increasingly heated argument.

Scotland does not control the legislation governing illegal drugs.

The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, which controls the production, supply and possession of controlled drugs, remains reserved to Westminster, while Holyrood is responsible for areas including health, treatment, social work, policing and prosecution.

Responsibility is therefore divided before the argument even begins.

Then there is poverty.

People living in Scotland’s most deprived communities were 15 times more likely to die from drugs in 2025 than those living in the least deprived areas.

That extraordinary disparity should be at the centre of any serious discussion about why Scotland continues to lose so many people.

Public Health Scotland has previously identified austerity as contributing to worsening health inequalities and says deprivation and inequality create difficult circumstances in which problematic drug use is commonly found.

People do not experience addiction in a vacuum.

Behind these statistics can lie poverty, trauma, poor health, insecure housing, unemployment, isolation and lives in which hope can become increasingly difficult to find.

Successive UK governments have pursued austerity policies which have affected public services and household incomes, while successive Scottish Governments have made their own decisions about how devolved budgets and services should be managed.

Neither level of government can simply point at the other and walk away.

Nor can Scotland ignore an increasingly dangerous illegal drugs market, with nitazenes implicated in 247 deaths last year and cocaine in 589.

The average age of someone dying from drugs has also risen from 32 in 2000 to 46 in 2025, suggesting a crisis carried through decades rather than one created during a single parliamentary term.

The SNP Government must answer difficult questions about what has worked, what has failed and why so many people continue to die despite substantial investment.

But Westminster controls the principal drugs legislation, governments at every level make decisions affecting poverty and public services, and opposition parties themselves disagree fundamentally about whether Scotland needs more harm reduction, less harm reduction or greater emphasis on rehabilitation.

Perhaps Scotland’s drug crisis is simply too serious, too old and too deeply rooted in inequality for the familiar claim that one political party is responsible for everything.

Because behind every political accusation sits a much harder truth.

When people lose opportunity they can lose hope, and when hope disappears, escaping reality can sometimes become easier than living with it.