Seán Haughey (Dublin North Central, Fianna Fail)

I appreciate Deputy Ó Snodaigh's advice. That is what I was going to do. A lot of information is provided in the script that may be of use to Members in their work dealing with the drugs issue.

I will turn to the east coast regional drugs task force. In terms of funding, across Government, we have had to take a range of difficult decisions, but our approach has been to do it in as balanced a way as possible. We are all faced with difficult decisions in the current economic circumstances, especially in the short term.

This year, the budget for community-based initiatives in the local and regional drugs task force areas, including funding for new cocaine and rehabilitation measures introduced during the year, will reach approximately €34.8 million. Funding for 2009 is approximately €34.6 million, which is a minor reduction of 0.5% on the 2008 allocation from the Department.

While it is accepted that there may be some additional costs for projects going into 2009, all task forces, including the ECRDTF, are being asked to identify savings across their area of responsibility. I understand there will be some difficult choices to make but these are challenging times economically and we must all work together to minimise the impact on front-line services. It will be a matter for all the drugs task forces to identify measures to enable them to work within their allocated budgets and decisions on the 2009 allocations for any individual projects in this case with regard to the east coast RDTF. The Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs will continue to liaise with the task forces, other relevant agencies and the national drugs strategy team in the months ahead to ensure the continued operation of vital services in disadvantaged areas most affected by drug misuse.

It should be noted also that the drugs strategy is based on a co-ordinated effort across many Departments and agencies and that the Department's allocation is only part of a much bigger investment programme in drugs services by those other bodies. In 2007, it was estimated that expenditure on drugs programmes across all the bodies was in the region of €230 million. I thank Deputy Ó Snodaigh for raising the matter.

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