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 Recent Home Office research
has shown seven out of ten people arrested has been found to be taking illegal
substances. Fieldwork in Liverpool, Nottingham, Sunderland, South London and
Norwood has shown 69% of people arrested have tested positive for drugs. In
fact the number of people arrested in Nottingham who tested positive for Heroin
doubled between 1997 and 1999. The proportion of offenders using Crack Cocaine
also rose from 10% to 23%. These figures are a reminder that there is still a
great deal to be done in combating the problems of substance misuse. As Tony
Blair re-appoints Keith Hallewell for another three years as the
Government’s Drugs Tsar, I hope he will focus on the excluded drug user in
the community.
Rehabilitation cannot be just confined to the therapy,
counselling and programme sessions. Society also needs rehabilitating. The
rehabilitated drug user can still be stigmatised as the Junkie. With a criminal
record of yesterday, the doors of employment and future opportunity can be
firmly closed.
I am keen that we as an organisation break down the
barriers of institutional prejudices and make it possible to reconcile the
excluded drug user with mainstream society. At the moment two of our clients
are preparing to study at a college in Oxford. My firm belief is that everyone
has potential. Nevertheless we need to meet people half way. |
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