Plans for spiking law welcomed by police boss

A new bill making spiking a criminal offence is expected to be introduced in the King's Speech

The government's plans to make spiking a specific offence has been welcomed by a police boss.

West Midlands Police and Crime Commisioner Simon Foster said the law would improve awareness and prevention and encourage reporting.

Spiking is already a crime, but a new bill making it a specific offence is expected to be announced in the King's Speech later.

Mr Foster said the move was about making it "clearer" that it was a "criminal offence."

Simon Foster was re-elected as West Midlands PCC in May

"I think it's about improving awareness, education and training and making it clearer around the particular offence," he said.

Spiking is the action of putting alcohol or drugs into someone's drink or into their body, without their consent or knowledge.

Symptoms when someone is spiked can include memory loss, confusion, vomiting and hallucinations.

Mr Foster described spiking as an "abhorrent and predatory and insidious act," but said it also faced challenges around obtaining "sufficient expert evidence" in order to establish the "exact nature" of spiking incidents.

"There are challenges around conviction rates in connection with these cases, in terms of being able to identify offenders, particularly in night-time economy venues," he said.

Speaking to BBC Radio WM, he said the new spiking law was also about improving training for door staff and improving the availability of drug testing kits because incidents were "time sensitive."

"I understand that drugs can pass through the system quite quickly so unless there is testing at an early stage, it can be quite difficult to establish exactly what the nature of the spiking that is taking place was," he explained.