TREATMENT NOT PRISON

Drug Tsar Keith Hellawell is quite upbeat in his annual report,
insisting that drug use among young people is rising at a slower rate
or levelling out.

In Greater Manchester, where the fight against drugs is spearheaded
by a partnership involving all 10 local authorities, the accent is
moving more towards offering drug offenders treatment rather than
locking them up in prison.

The system - arrest referral - offers addicts arrested for a variety
of offences the opportunity of accepting treatment for their
addiction or being sent to prison.

Arrest referral will be backed up by new treatment and testing orders
which will give the courts powers to put drug users on a programme of
treatment to get them off drugs and to monitor progress with urine
checks on a regular basis. Those found to be using drugs will be sent
to prison, where drug treatment programmes are also in operation.

If treatment programmes work - if they help drug offenders to kick
the habit and to stay off drugs - they will prove far cheaper in the
long run than custodial sentences followed by a return to drug abuse
and crime.

But there are question marks about the infrastructure behind any drug
treatment programme and whether the drug services really have the
resources to cope with offering treatment to all those who need it
and then the support and back-up to help recovering addicts stay
drug-free.