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‘What we need to do is rage against
cuts to services, and advocate for
innovative community based
solutions that have a passion to serve
the needs of people coming to them.’
Vital challenge
Kaleidoscope was one of the original
drug services in England, and a pioneer
of harm reduction services,
campaigning against long waiting lists
by providing rapid access to treatment.
Over time local authorities improved
the services to their own drug using
population and the need for our
services was reduced. At the same time,
however, I saw many small drug
services struggling to survive, losing
their community based, charitable
services to the large corporate drug
services. The campaigning voice was
beginning to get quieter as services
recognised that responding to the
demands of the commissioners was
more important than meeting the
needs of the service user.
So 13 years ago we were offered a
route out of England to establish drug
services in Newport, South Wales.
There were significant problems in
Wales with access to treatment and
poor treatment outcomes. At the same
time there seemed to be a real
commitment to tackle the issues of
drug and alcohol use that came from
government and the local communities, which was incredibly refreshing.
In Wales there was a communitarian
approach with the concept of co10 | drinkanddrugsnews | December 2016
production