Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have an opportunity to speak in this debate. It is just a pity there are so few Deputies present. Perhaps that has something to do with the timing of the debate. It would have been nice to see it more centre stage. I wish to contribute to the debate as a long-standing member of the Ballymun Local Drugs Task Force. I have also had an involvement in the Finglas Cabra Local Drug & Alcohol Task Force.

The drugs strategy was established in 1998. I think it is true to say that at this stage in the development of the response to drugs, there are still a huge number of gaps in it and in some ways we have gone backwards. I read the statement the Taoiseach made this time last year when the new strategy was launched. He spoke about the republic of opportunity and said that, if it is to be meaningful, it must apply to all. However, I suspect that in the meantime very few people who have been excluded through addiction feel any sense of this being a Republic for them because not much progress has been made in implementing the strategy. There are 50 actions set out in the strategy. Most of the task forces, I think, are serious about taking on these actions and have no choice but to do so really because of the fact that they deal with all aspects of addiction on a day-to-day basis. However, the same cannot be said of the national agencies and Departments and their commitment to implement the strategy.

It has been like this for some time. When the drugs strategy was established initially at a time before the crash in the economy and when the Taoiseach of the day took a more centre-stage role on the strategy, a clear instruction was given to all Departments and relevant agencies to participate fully. That co-ordination of the strategy was taking place in the Taoiseach's office, which gave it muscle and a status it has lost in recent years.

In 2011 I had a short period of having responsibility for the drugs strategy. I was appointed first of all as Minister of State with responsibility for primary care. It was some time later that I got a telephone call from a Minister saying they had forgotten about the drugs portfolio and asking if I would take it on as well. It has become a bit of a pass-the-parcel. Since the days when the national strategy team was based in the Department of the Taoiseach, it has lost much of its priority in political eyes. We see that in how the different oversight bodies function. This is in respect of the national steering committee and that co-ordinating body. While it is not a new thing and not specifically the fault of the Minister of State, it is a fault of Government that insufficient priority has been given to this important area.

With the steering committee, people come along to fill a seat without participating and without taking responsibility for the implementation of the strategy. I have seen this at first hand and I know it has continued for a number of years. Representatives from different Departments come along and give the impression it is a real drag for them to have to attend these meetings. They sit there and generally do not contribute very much. In the main the meetings are organised such that there are constant presentations on different things, which in turn lets everybody off the hook, rather than those meetings being challenging meetings where, for example, the Garda representatives are asked what they have done to respond to the issues raised at the previous meeting or officials from the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection are asked what they are doing to provide adequate training for people struggling with addiction problems.

The Department of Education and Skills refused to provide a representative for a long period. Officials from the Department of Education and Skills need to be asked what that Department is doing to solve that aspect of the problem because we know that a large number of drug users have a problem with education disadvantage. The profile is there; we know what contributes to a high likelihood that somebody will get involved in substance misuse and addiction that can blight their lives.

There is a huge issue there. It is not just about the Department of Health. It is all very well to say that it has to be a health-led response. However, all these other agencies also have a responsibility and it seems they are not fulfilling that responsibility. From reports I hear, I know how those two national bodies operate and they are not being challenged.

Moreover, they are not participating in local drugs task forces either. The Garda will send along a community garda instead of the inspector or superintendent attending and bringing along somebody from the drugs unit. People from the Department of Education and Skills occasionally attend. It took years for them to agree to participate. I have long maintained that it is not just about them coming along to contribute to the drugs task force meeting; it is about the drugs task force discussions informing senior people from the Department of Education and Skills who need to be educated about the areas that have the biggest drug problems.

The Minister of State has a responsibility to challenge these people and I do not think that is happening. For example, there is a question about how these meetings are organised. Is it about putting in the time, coming along, doing the two hours and sitting there silently? That is what it seems to be and that is how it is viewed. The Minister of State and the support people she has with her who have a responsibility for chairing those meetings need to ensure that those meetings are meaningful.

Those attending should start off by hearing what is happening outside the walls of Departments, which in the main are rarefied areas. The Minister of State needs to be hearing back from the drugs task forces as to what it is actually like in the real world. That information coming back to her should inform the work of the national agencies and Departments.

Those meetings need to be challenging for all of the attendees. One way to do that is to put up the 50 actions that have been promised and to seek regular progress reports from the different agencies on what they are doing to implement them. We all know how it is possible to put in two or three hours at a meeting that ends up being pretty meaningless unless people are challenged and expected to actually do things between those meetings.

We heard much from the previous Minister of State about injecting rooms, which is a very small aspect of the drugs issue and it should not have been allowed to dominate. It is no big deal but it seems to have been treated as a big deal.

We are now talking about decriminalisation and have appointed an expert group, which is fine. I believe that should happen but let us not fool ourselves into thinking that will somehow solve the drugs problem. Some people have serious addiction problems that are destroying their lives. They need to be responded to and that is the hard end of the thing.

In addition, let us not fool ourselves that it is all about heroin. Heroin treatment seems to be fixation of the Department of Health and the HSE. That is why there has been such a poor response to the growing problem with cocaine and crack cocaine. I have raised this several times and it is very hard to know if there are any services to address the growing cocaine problem.

It is shocking that it is six and a half years since a memo was first brought to Cabinet about the alcohol Bill and we still have not seen it passed. We have been promised it time and time again. It was definitely supposed to have been through before this summer but that has not happened.

All of these issues need urgent attention. However, unless we start to tackle the causes of addiction in a meaningful way, we will not change the situation; we will continue to have a major problem that blights particular areas. That is why the Government must be challenged to tackle the problem of economic, social and educational disadvantage, as well as the lack of housing which all feed into our shameful level of addiction.

The Minister of State has one part to play and I have outlined that she should be challenging everybody and driving this strategy to make it a reality. All of her ministerial colleagues have a responsibility in eradicating the causes of addiction.

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