What is Spiking?

Spiking is giving someone alcohol or drugs without them knowing or agreeing. It can happen in multiple ways:

• Drink spiking: adding drugs or alcohol to someone else’s drink.
• Needle spiking: injecting drugs into someone else’s body with a needle or auto-injector pen.
• Vape or cigarette spiking: giving someone drugs in a cigarette or e-cigarette.
• Food spiking: adding drugs to someone’s food.

Giving someone more alcohol or drugs than they were expecting and consented to is also spiking. For example, giving someone double shots instead of single ones.

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A new focus on spiking in the UK

There was a government meeting on November 25 2024 to discuss spiking offences in the UK.

Police chiefs, industry executives and transport bosses were called to Downing Street to crack down on spiking and support the Government’s pledge to protect women and girls. Spiking will become a new criminal offence in the UK, replacing a complicated range of laws that currently illegalise spiking. The Government committed to halve violence against women and girls, making it central to the government’s mission to make UK streets safer.

Also, the government has set aside £250,000 in order to offer specialist training to 10,000 workers in the hospitality sector across the UK by Spring 2025.

Training started in December 2024, equipping night-time economy staff with skills to prevent spiking incidents, support people that have been spiked and assist the police in gathering evidence against perpetrators. Training sessions are online and free to access for nightclub, bar and pub owners and staff.

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The existing legal protections

Spiking offences are currently covered by more than one law. Most spiking cases are offences under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. This Act covers the use of harmful substances. The Sexual Offences Act 2003 covers cases where someone spikes a victim to sexually assault them.

Depending on the circumstances, the following offences could apply to both drink spiking and needle spiking:

Administering a substance with intent: this offence is committed where a person intentionally administers a substance to, or causes a substance to be taken by, another person (B), knowing that B does not consent and with the intention of stupefying or overpowering B so as to enable any person to engage in a sexual activity involving B¹.

Administering poison or other noxious thing: these offences involve administering “any poison or other destructive or noxious thing” to another person. For the section 23 offence, the conduct must thereby endanger the other person’s life, or inflict upon them grievous bodily harm. For the section 24 offence, the perpetrator must intend to injure, aggrieve or annoy the victim.²

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National statistics

In a YouGov poll (Dec 2022), 10% of women and 5% of men said they had been spiked.

The police received 6,732 reports of spiking in the year ending April 2023, 957 relating to needle spiking.

According to data from the National Police Chiefs’ Council (Dec 2022), based on people who have reported that they have been spiked: 

• The average age of victims across all types of spiking was 26 years
• Women were the targets in the majority of all spiking offences (74%)³

Drink-spiking offences have more than quadrupled in London over five years, according to Metropolitan Police data. At the beginning of 2018 there were 497 recorded offences, rising to 2,066 by the end of 2022. This rise may be a reflection of increased reporting of offences, caused by increasing awareness. 

In 2023, more incidents of drink spiking occurred in bars (41%) and clubs (28%) than anywhere else.

LGBTQIA+ adults are disproportionately affected and are almost twice as likely to report having been spiked (17.8% vs. 10.6%; 2022 data) compared to cis-heterosexual individuals.

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Avon & Somerset statistics

Avon and Somerset police recorded 41 reported incidents of spiking in 2015, 67 in 2016 and 78 in 2017 reported incidents, a 90% increase over 3 years. This data comes from a Freedom of Information request sent to Avon and Somerset police in 2018 by Sky News.⁴

In a separate data report, between 2016 and March 2021 Police in Avon and Somerset recorded 486 incidents of suspected drink spiking.⁵ This culminated in 27 arrests, a 5.5% rate.

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Issues with current processes

Reporting 

Incidents of spiking are very often under reported, there is a widespread mistrust of the police’s ability and desire to follow up on reports of spiking and limited expectation that a charge or prosecution will occur. Drinkaware and Anglia Ruskn University found that 90% of spiking incidents go unreported, around half of the people that did not report being spiked said they ‘didn’t see the point’.⁶

Prosecuting 

For the police and CPS to charge and prosecute a spiking incident (without a secondary offence), they must have an identified suspect, evidence of the substance used and its impact on the spiked individual. Assessing the impact of the offence on an individual can be simple to do through victim and witness testimony/statements. Identifying a suspect, (particularly as these incidents tend to occur in busy, night-time economy venues), testing the victim quickly and collecting any evidence that may have been prove much more challenging.⁷

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What to expect when reporting

If the person who was spiked is comfortable talking about what happened, the police will ask them to go over four things⁸:

• What happened?​
• Where did it happen?​
• When did it happen?​
• Do they know who might have done it?​

If the police feel it’s appropriate, they will take a non-invasive urine sample. Some drugs leave the body in a very short time so it’s important to test as soon as possible. Other drugs remain in the body longer, so testing will be considered up to 7 days after the incident occurred. The test results will come back within 3 weeks and will be discussed with the person who was spiked.  ​

​The testing done by the police is the most effective way of finding out whether someone has been spiked – it can detect over a hundred different types of drugs.

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Support services available

With specialist training, and a proactive approach to preventing and prosecuting offenders, night-time venues can be a critical part of the solution to reduce spiking offences. Reports need to be taken seriously, CCTV needs to be readily available, and testing kits for drinks and substances available to staff. Security teams need to be proactive in holding and searching suspected perpetrators, and then informing the police.

Areas in or near zones of night-time activity equipped with trained staff are a great way to keep people safe while they are out. Bristol is trialling a Night-time safety zone, for example. Expanding similar campaigns across the country could be a crucial step in achieving the Government’s aim of halving violence of women and girls.

You can visit Avon and Somerset police webpage to report spiking.

We are here to listen and believe anyone who has experienced spiking. Find out more about our services.

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This blog is written by Toby Howells, a volunteer communications officer with SARSAS. Toby graduated from the University of York’s Law School in 2020, studying public and criminal law and now works for Bristol City Council.

1. Sexual Offences Act 2003, section 61 ↩︎
2. Offences against the Person Act 1861 ↩︎
3. Spiking: factsheet – GOV.UK ↩︎
4. How many cases of spiking are there in your region? | UK News | Sky News ↩︎
5. committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/42967/pdf/ ↩︎
6. drink-spiking-research-report-2024.pdf ↩︎
7. Report: Understanding and tackling spiking (accessible) – GOV.UK ↩︎
8. Spiking: factsheet – GOV.UK ↩︎