These regulations revoke and re-enact, with amendments, the provisions of the Misuse of Drugs (Northern Ireland) Regulations 1986, as amended. They provide certain exemptions from the provisions of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 which, subject to such regulations, prohibit the production, importation, exportation, possession and supply of controlled drugs, which are specified in Schedule 2 to that Act. The regulations also make provision in relation to prescriptions, records and the furnishing of information concerning controlled drugs and for the supervision of the destruction of such drugs.

Two changes of substance are made by the regulations. One is the addition of thirty-five phenethylamine derivatives which are made subject to control under the Act of 1971 by virtue of the Misuse of Drugs (Modification) Order 2001 (S.I. 2001/3932) to Schedule 1 and one such derivative to Schedule 2. The other change is that the 33 benzodiazepines and 8 other substances formerly in Schedule 4 Part II are now in Part I of that Schedule. They are no longer exempt from the prohibition on importation and exportation or from the prohibition on possession when in the form of a medicinal product. The 54 anabolic substances formerly in Schedule 4 Part I are now in Part II of that Schedule. There are no changes to the controls which currently apply to these substances.