Ms Bernie Meally:

What we know is that alcohol related offences constitute up to 50% of all youth crime. By this I do not mean that one sees drunkenness as 50% of youth crime in the statistics for the country or for particular catchment areas. What one sees are the likes of minor assault as a result of a young person getting drunk and ending up in an argument and a physical altercation with someone. One might see the likes of criminal damage, whereby someone is drunk and smashes all the wing mirrors on the street as he or she walks home, or one could see the likes of theft from a shop, whereby a person either steals alcohol to drink or steals other items to make the money to get alcohol.

If one were to look at the statistics on drugs, one would believe there is not a drug problem among the youth population in this country at all. We know anecdotally, however, that there are pockets where there are huge issues of drug use and substance misuse. For us, one of the major challenges in this regard is the real lack of under 18s substance misuse services and supports. In some areas and counties there is nothing. We have youth workers and youth justice workers who will access any training they can to be able to work with a young person. Our area of expertise in respect of substance misuse in the youth work arena is around education, awareness and prevention. When it comes to the field of intervention, there are other professionals who are much better placed to meet a young person's needs. If a young person is actively engaging in substance use to the point at which it goes beyond experimentation and there is the start of a dependence on a substance, professionals should be working with those young people. What we have in many communities are youth workers and other community organisations doing their very best to support these young people because no service is available or there are huge waiting lists to access those services.

The other issue we find is that many young people with substance misuse issues have underlying mental health issues. A young person who is drinking or using substances could be doing so to help deal with anxiety, depression or chaos at home or for other reasons. We find, however, that the community adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, will not work with that young person in dealing with his or her mental health issues because he or she has a dual diagnosis of a substance misuse issue. Then there are people - again, I am talking especially about youth workers - in a community trying to hold and support young people and getting them to a point at which they can engage with a mental health service. It is just very challenging for those working on the ground.