FEDERAL STRATEGY IGNORES ALCOHOL

While welcoming news of the federal government's proposed anti-drug
strategy, some Saskatchewan officials say it doesn't go far enough to
deal with one of the biggest and most troublesome addictions out
there: Alcohol.

"I guess one of the weaknesses I think in the whole strategy is that
it doesn't address alcohol," Healthy Living Services Minister Graham
Addley said.

"All of the experts know that while there's a certain amount of fear
out there with the illicit drugs, the drug that causes the most harm
in society is alcohol. So it would be nice if some resources could be
allocated to addressing the addiction that individuals in society
have towards alcohol."

Moose Jaw Police Service Chief Terry Coleman -- who's also president
of the Saskatchewan Association of Chiefs of Police -- agreed that
while illicit drugs do pose a problem, alcohol and other non-illicit
drugs should also be taken into account.

"The various drug strategies that are in place in Saskatchewan are
very, very cognizant of what you might call the legal drugs that we
encounter and how they're abused, around alcohol and prescription
drugs ..." he said.

"Governments, they tend to deal with I suppose the higher-profile
drugs, the cocaine, the crack and the heroin. That's not to say they
haven't spent time, money and energy dealing with things like
impaired driving and alcohol abuse. But (illicit drugs are) higher profile."

Prime Minister Stephen Harper recently announced details of the
federal government's new anti-drug strategy that is intended to crack
down on those who produce and deal in drugs, as well as help addicts
and prevent people from becoming addicted in the first place.

The $63.8-million plan, to be introduced this fall, will be divvied
up among three areas: $10 million for prevention, $32 million for
treatment, and $22 million for enforcement.

While Coleman and Addley agreed the strategy is a step in the right
direction, they said there is plenty more work that needs to be done
in order to effectively deal with drug and alcohol addictions issues.

"It sounds like a lot of money, but when you start dividing that up
across the country, it doesn't go very far," Coleman said. "At the
end of the day will it solve the problem? No, it won't. I think it's
a good move, and as the spokesperson for the police, we welcome it
and we welcome that it's not just enforcement, it's on the prevention
and the education side as well ...

"If we could deal with issues of substance abuse and all its
manifestations, there would be a lot less for police to deal with. In
fact, police would have very little to deal with because if you track
many of the calls for service we get, many of the offences we
investigate, you can track them back directly or indirectly to abuse
of some type of substance."

Addley said that should Saskatchewan get its share of the federal
funds -- an estimated $2 million -- it would still not come close to
the $18.5 million the provincial government has invested so far in
drug strategies, like the three-year Project Hope.