Police must abandon their reliance on arrests and seizures when combating the UK’s £5.3bn narcotics trade and look at more enlightened ways of moving drugs markets away from vulnerable communities, according to a leading drugs think-tank.

A report from the UK Drug Policy Commission, set up two years ago to drive government thinking on the issue, found traditional measures of success against dealers – particularly seizures and arrests – were of “limited value” in countering “entrenched” markets, which are “large, resilient and quick to adapt”. It also found that arrests could inflict even more damage on a neighbourhood by sparking turf wars between gangs.