Mr. Andy O'Hara:

We trust them completely. Rightly, we are talking about a health-led response. It is not even just a health-led response. It is a social and health-led response. The national drugs strategy is always going to be limited. The following was said at the citizens' assembly, and named in the strategy stuff. This is a comprehensive national cross-departmental approach. We must have an approach that addresses all of the underlying issues of housing, education, employment opportunities and better communities and better futures. It is okay to have a national drugs strategy that mentions some of that but there will be no progress unless the strategy is linked into a broader housing policy. A lot of the problems that we are seeing now are linked back to the failed housing policy. So we are always trying to play catch-up and fill in the gaps. We need to have interventions and preventative measures but, going back to the structural analysis, we must do the following.

Listen to people who use drugs. Listen to families. Listen to communities. People know what the issues are. People have been saying what they are for 30 to 40 years. It is not rocket science. It came up in the citizens' assembly where there was a bit of a demoralised approach at times, like this was a wicked problem or some mad problem that cannot be fixed. There are solutions, and they are linked to poverty, power and the social determinants approach. If we do not address all of them and keep trying, we will never catch up. We will always have good interventions and responses. Plenty of them have been allowed out of it. We need to continue to have these. We need massive interventions, investment and funding in inner-city areas. In 40 years how about if we have fewer services or a decrease in services or responses?