Ms Cindy Barry:

In terms of Deputy Burke's question about how can we co-ordinate family support, it is important to highlight that organisations like ourselves were born out of there being no services available for families. They had to build themselves up from the ground up. We are specifically peer led. Everybody in our organisation has experience of addiction in the family. Not all family support has that across the board.

In terms of joined-up policy, that is where we need the support of the Government to step in because we built this up and are trying to fund it ourselves. The need for our services is growing more and more and we need to come together more in committees like this to discuss it. Our group - which is alone in the north east - does not have answers on how to spread this nationally but we do recognise that it is needed.