Mr. Jim Doherty:

I just want to add a couple of issues. One of these, touched on by Ms Bairéad and others, is mental health. In my 25 years working with drug users in various roles, mental health problems are what drive much of the drug use. Some people feel drug use can lead to mental health problems. That can happen, of course, but it has not been overwhelmingly my experience. My overwhelming experience has been of people trying to medicate themselves for things already wrong in their lives, emotions and how they feel about their lives. Yet, time after time we develop these national drug strategies in the absence of mental health services. There seems to be almost no conversation between the two. Drugs projects end up working with significantly mentally ill people, often with quite serious diagnoses, without any great training, experience or qualifications and generally with very little support from local mental health services. We work with the individuals because they are using drugs. The mental health services, on the other hand, seem to take the view that once someone stops using drugs, they can then engage with them. It is rather like saying to a man with a crutch that you will work with him on the fourth floor but that he has to throw away the crutch first. Surely mental health services should be intrinsically involved in drug services and there should be regular conversation and considerable consultation, because the two issues are so interlinked. It is a matter of great dismay to everyone working in the area that they do not have that support.