Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)

We live in interesting times and virtually every sector of Government funding has been hard hit by cutbacks, a levy, a budget and, next month, a mini-budget, all of which has happened in the space of six months. It is therefore not surprising that the national drugs strategy has suffered a reduction in its budget from €37 million to €34 million. Every local drugs task force, State agency and community group providing a local drugs service is worried about cutbacks and funding for their services and projects. They are worried about loss of staff through redundancies and the inability to plan for the full financial year.

It is particularly alarming to hear that funding for the Dial to Stop Drug Dealing and Threats initiative is now capped at €300,000 and will be unlikely to be able to proceed after June of this year. This programme has been piloted successfully in a number of rural and urban areas, including the north inner city in my own constituency. It provides a confidential telephone line which can be used in privacy and with absolute security by drug addicts, their families, neighbours and others who are often subjected to intimidation by drug barons to extract money from them or to force them to sell drugs. Gardaí regard this programme as a valuable resource in the fight against drugs. It is not expensive and becomes more and more cost-effective as it is rolled out throughout the country. It would be a shame if it became another casualty of the recession.

It appears that the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs is using the backdrop and cover of the recession and the budgetary cutbacks to restructure the national drugs strategy without any consultation with its component parts. The national drugs strategy is a complex edifice which has multi-agency and community participation at its heart. If this co-operative and holistic approach is undermined, the entire edifice will collapse, which would be disastrous as the present approach is the only one that can work.

The Garda, with all the legislation in the world, cannot deal with the drugs threat effectively. As the unemployment queues increase alarmingly, regeneration schemes shelved or collapsed and marginalised communities become more marginalised, the ground becomes increasingly fertile for the drugs barons to ply their trade. This is not the time for retrenchment within the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. It is not the time to abandon the tried and tested multifaceted approach or to centralise the delivery of services to those vulnerable and marginalised people affected by substance abuse the length and breadth of Ireland. I ask the Minister to retain the integrated partnership approach that values community participation in decision making at local, regional and national level in the drugs strategy, and not to jeopardise the real progress made over the past 12 years.

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