On Tuesday 7th July, Taking Action on Addiction, a Forward Trust campaign, will be at the House of Lords to launch a landmark report on drug and alcohol addiction across the UK.
Co-authored with Crest Advisory, this will be the first time that addiction rates across England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland have been revealed in a single report. The report will share everything we are learning about the new trends in drug supply and distribution and the challenges services have in responding.
With a new prime minister expected in Downing Street in the coming weeks, the report will make a series of policy recommendations designed to reboot the UK’s addiction policy.
These proposals reflect the ideas, experiences, stories, and insights of our community - of the people and families who tell us about their battles with addiction and the services and communities providing support.
The report will make the following recommendations to address addiction:
Give renewed political leadership to the urgent challenge of reducing the number of drug and alcohol related deaths.
Maintain reliable funding for the drug and alcohol treatment and recovery services in every area of the country.
Make it easier to get access to recovery programmes – in residential, non-residential or prison settings, for people living with addiction and their loved ones.
Strengthen strategies to reduce the impact of addiction on crime and anti-social behaviour.
Boost efforts to limit accessibility of cheap alcohol.
Learn lessons from the development of drug and alcohol policy and grasp the opportunity provided by the Gambling Levy.
Target funding on programmes and interventions with greatest impact on priority outcomes– reducing deaths, reducing crime, and increasing recovery.
Increase public visibility of support for people struggling with addiction.
Tackle the shame and stigma that prevent people from seeking help by increasing public awareness of the nature and causes of addiction, and the possibilities and benefits of recovery.
Get involved on social media
This new report will show the impact of addiction and how it continues to affect millions of people across the UK, but stigma and silence stop too many from asking for help.
This year, we continue to ask everyone to join the conversation.
By talking openly about addiction, we can replace stigma with understanding, judgement with empathy, and silence with support.
Support Taking Action on Addiction on social media by engaging with our posts and sharing your stories of addiction and recovery within the current UK system(s), and use the campaign hashtag - #LetsTalkAddiction
Help us to Get The Nation Talking About Addiction, so that no one feels they need to deal with this issue alone.