The drug epidemic in HMP Barlinnie, Scotland’s largest prison and home to around 1,500 men, is so severe that 80% of inmates are estimated to have a narcotics problem
A new BBC documentary is shining a light on the drug epidemic in HMP Barlinnie, Scotland’s largest prison. Home to around 1500 men, it’s so severe that 80% of inmates are estimated to have a narcotics problem. Opened in 1882, the Glasgow jail – where inmates are serving time for crimes from murder and assault to theft and sexual offences – has held some of the country’s most notorious criminals, including serial killer Peter Manuel, gangster Jimmy Boyle, and Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.
Severe overcrowding means most prisoners share cells and are fed on just £4 a day. But narcotics are the biggest problem, with staff seeing a dramatic rise in drug use in the last decade, since psychoactive substances known as legal highs started coming in – soaked into paper and smoked in vapes.
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Barlinnie’s problem is twice as bad as most jails in England and Wales, where a 2025 Government report estimated 39% of prisoners could readily access drugs. Prison governor, Mick Stoney, says: “It’s a constant battle to keep drugs out, [coming in] through visits, throwovers, drones.” Barlinnie’s health and wellbeing manager, Geoff Weaver, adds: “You’ve got the synthetic drugs coming in. The potency is so high and the dose is so low. The risk of overdose then spirals out of control. We’re seeing guys now constantly going out in ambulances because they’re overdosing.”
Drug-related deaths and suicides have also soared in the last decade. In 2024–2025 there were 64 drug-related deaths in Scottish jails – a record high – a 60% increase in one year. It’s meant increased violence, according to Mick, who says: “Back in the day when you knew someone was violent and dangerous, you were always wary. Nowadays it could be anybody – and it’s due to the drugs they take.”
But an extraordinary initiative, the Recovery Cafe – featured in the two part documentary Inside Barlinnie, starting on BBC2 on Thursday – has been getting men back on track. Run by the Sisco charity, peer led and self-policed by prisoners, it’s helping inmates to get clean, but offering them a safe environment to address complex needs and trauma caused by addiction and providing a bridge between prison and the outside world.
Natalie Logan, 46 – herself an ex-prisoner – runs Barlinnie’s Recovery Cafe. Coming from poverty in Glasgow, she says: “My father was a bank robber, who took his own life when I was five. My mother was in and out of prison for petty theft. My brother was a drug addict. I started drinking as a child and was addicted to drugs by my teens. I was arrested for the first time at 22 and spent time inside for being drunk and disorderly.
“I’ve walked where these men have walked. The governor, Mick Stoney, took a massive gamble when he allowed peer-led, lived experience individuals into his establishment without officers in the room. But we have an 83% success rate of people not returning to prison. We’ve supported 18 men that have been in prison for life sentences. Not one has returned.”
Mum to Braiden, 20, and Kolby, 17, Natalie, who lives in East Dunbartonshire, fled a toxic relationship while pregnant with her eldest, but admits: “I didn’t have the tools to be a mother. I got into another toxic relationship and had my second son. When he was in nursery I went to them for help. I said, ‘I’m using drugs, I’m drinking chaotically. I can’t look after my children. I need you to help me’. And they did – they contacted social workers.”
Natalie got clean in rehab, then began working with ex-addicts, before joining Phoenix Futures, starting community initiatives. And in 2016 the 5-day-a-week Recovery Cafe opened at Barlinnie. She continues: “I know what the prisoners are going through. I try to meet their needs, giving them certainty, safety and security.”
The Recovery Cafe is a space where they can “be vulnerable and figure out how to be the best version of themselves.” Natalie tells the story of a troubled 31-year-old man they are working with from a deprived background, who’s always been told he’s useless, as his only interest is in drama. She says: “We’ve got him to a place of recovery and he’s now doing films. It’s just brilliant.”
Describing the format of the Recovery Cafe, she says: “We start with an emotional check-in. Then we do an offender focus group, for example, what does victim remorse look like? We end on a positive note with a quiz or bingo and always finish with a dance-off, to raise adrenaline and release all bad energies.”
Putting in 17 hour days, Natalie tells the men to call her if they are struggling. Bemoaning the lack of funding for the Scottish prison service, she says: “With more resources to fund things like Sisco, we wouldn’t just be churning people out of prison unwell. We wouldn’t be just warehousing people.
“Prisons are more like mental health asylums now. You’ve got your small cohort of people that should absolutely be there, because they have committed heinous crimes. Then you’ve got a massive population of people who are just in and out. I came from poverty. You’re almost written off by society. But I’ve almost laughed in the face of adversity and turned my trauma into something more hopeful. I’m now a beacon of light, saying ‘if I can do this – you can do it too.’”
“If it wasn’t for the Recovery Cafe, I’d be back in jail”
Bobby Alexander, 45, served 27 months for assault and is now seven months clean and sober. After help from the Recovery Cafe in Barlinnie, he left prison and went to a residential rehab facility through the Prison to Rehab Scheme.
He says of the Recovery Cafe: “I thought I was a down and out and nobody liked me. That I couldn’t do anything better. They gave me the confidence to see through all that. If it wasn’t for them I’d probably be back in jail by now. It broke that cycle. It’s a journey [staying clean]. But as long as I keep putting the work in, I know somewhere along the line I’m going to figure out where I am. I just want to be comfortable in my own skin. I want a wee pet, I want to be able to drive and I want to go on holiday – these are things I’ve never been able to do before. Everything I’ve tried to work towards before, it crumbled. I don’t want to be on drugs anymore, I want to get on with my life. To have this support network around me, it feels great. This time I’ve got a bit of hope, that’s the difference.”
“I had to rob Greggs just to eat – this is like a two star hotel to me”
JP, 28, is serving a three year sentence for assault and robbery. He attends a prison art class, but is still using drugs and hasn’t accepted help from the Recovery Cafe.
He says: “I’ve been smoking crack since I was 13. I’ve been taking heroin since I was 15. I’ve got far too many problems to stay 100% sober. People give you anything in here. It’s easier for me in here than out there. I was homeless, nowhere to go, had to rob Greggs just to eat – whereas, in here, I’m getting a gaff. Don’t need to pay any bills. This is like a two star hotel to me. People say its brutal being dubbed up, I’ve been dubbed up my full life. I’ve been in homes since I was two months old, so I’m a product of the care system. I call it the animal factory. When you’re in the care system, it’s something like 90% of weans will end up in a secure unit and something like 96% of weans will end up in a prison at least once in their lifetime. I’m just one of them. I’ll get out there and I’ll come back. That’s just my life. I’ll probably die in jail and I’ve made peace with that.”
*Inside Barlinnie is on BBC Two and iPlayer on Thursday 9th April at 9pm
