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Another Belter From Nicola Sturgeon
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After heroin handouts for junkies and free booze for alcoholics, the SNP’s craziest ‘plan’ to f ight our drink and drugs crisis...
The Scottish Mail on Sunday11 Jul 2021By Georgia Edkins
ON THE HOUSE: Drinks
DRUG addicts will be handed free smartphones under controversial plans by the SNP taskforce set up to tackle Scotland’s spiralling drug death toll.
The group will give the devices and free internet and data ‘bundles’ to more than 2,000 addicts.
The Drug Deaths Taskforce says the £2.75 million ‘digital inclusion’ drive will ‘help people at risk from drug-related harm stay connected to life-saving services’.
But last night, a leading addiction charity hit out at the project. Annemarie Ward, of Favor Scotland, said: ‘Giving smartphones to users is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.’
The bizarre plan comes after The Mail on Sunday revealed an SNP-backed scheme to give heroin addicts free drugs and proposals to hand out hourly free booze to alcoholics.
Critics last night slammed the
smartphone giveaway – and said the money would be better spent on residential rehabilitation beds to help people recover.
Analysis by Favor Scotland shows Glasgow alone has about 13,000 problem drug users – but just 16 rehab beds.
Scotland is the drug fatality capital of Europe, with a record 1,264 in 2019 – double the number of 2014.
According to the National Records of Scotland, the drug death rate is about three-and-a-half times higher than the UK as a whole.
Tory health spokesman Annie Wells said: ‘Drug deaths are Scotland’s national shame and it is Nicola Sturgeon’s SNP Government who shamefully took their eye off the ball on this issue.
‘Believing that handing out smartphones and other digital devices to those suffering from addiction should surely have been a nonstarter. The near £3 million being spent on this project should be
‘There is a middle-class naivety at the taskforce’
directed elsewhere to fund vital rehabilitation beds for those who need them most.’
She added: ‘Far too many people who want to get off drugs simply can’t get the treatment they need.’
Ms Ward, chief executive of Favor Scotland, added: ‘There is a middle-class naivety at the Drug Deaths Taskforce that is trying to sort out a problem that they don’t even come close to understanding.
‘People are dying in more numbers than we’ve seen in any part of the world at any time in history. We are not managing this.’
The taskforce was set up by the SNP in 2019. The group – made up of about 20 drug-use ‘experts’, including academics, policy advisers, police officers and prosecution specialists – advises the Scottish Government and public bodies.
However, the team has been criticised for its ‘right-on’ approach.
In one of its first reports, it declared that addicts face ‘social stigma’ that is as bad as ‘sexism and racism’. It said taking drugs should no longer be frowned upon because ‘many people use a range of substances without harm’.
And it added that abstinence should no longer be the end goal of treatment.
In January, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon pledged to do more to reduce the death toll, which she branded a ‘national disgrace’, and appointed a new Minister for Drugs Policy, Angela Constance.
Earlier this year, we told how a controversial scheme in which heroin is given to addicts to manage their craving was being rolled out nationwide. We also revealed a pilot in Glasgow that would see alcoholics given free ‘doses’ of booze to manage their drinking.
The Scottish Government said there was £100 million of extra funding to expand rehabilitation facilities.
It added: ‘The Drug Deaths Taskforce – whose membership includes those with lived experience and their families – has funded more than 30 innovative projects and ten research projects to reduce harm and improve and save lives.
https:/
After heroin handouts for junkies and free booze for alcoholics, the SNP’s craziest ‘plan’ to f ight our drink and drugs crisis...
The Scottish Mail on Sunday11 Jul 2021By Georgia Edkins
ON THE HOUSE: Drinks
DRUG addicts will be handed free smartphones under controversial plans by the SNP taskforce set up to tackle Scotland’s spiralling drug death toll.
The group will give the devices and free internet and data ‘bundles’ to more than 2,000 addicts.
The Drug Deaths Taskforce says the £2.75 million ‘digital inclusion’ drive will ‘help people at risk from drug-related harm stay connected to life-saving services’.
But last night, a leading addiction charity hit out at the project. Annemarie Ward, of Favor Scotland, said: ‘Giving smartphones to users is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.’
The bizarre plan comes after The Mail on Sunday revealed an SNP-backed scheme to give heroin addicts free drugs and proposals to hand out hourly free booze to alcoholics.
Critics last night slammed the
smartphone giveaway – and said the money would be better spent on residential rehabilitation beds to help people recover.
Analysis by Favor Scotland shows Glasgow alone has about 13,000 problem drug users – but just 16 rehab beds.
Scotland is the drug fatality capital of Europe, with a record 1,264 in 2019 – double the number of 2014.
According to the National Records of Scotland, the drug death rate is about three-and-a-half times higher than the UK as a whole.
Tory health spokesman Annie Wells said: ‘Drug deaths are Scotland’s national shame and it is Nicola Sturgeon’s SNP Government who shamefully took their eye off the ball on this issue.
‘Believing that handing out smartphones and other digital devices to those suffering from addiction should surely have been a nonstarter. The near £3 million being spent on this project should be
‘There is a middle-class naivety at the taskforce’
directed elsewhere to fund vital rehabilitation beds for those who need them most.’
She added: ‘Far too many people who want to get off drugs simply can’t get the treatment they need.’
Ms Ward, chief executive of Favor Scotland, added: ‘There is a middle-class naivety at the Drug Deaths Taskforce that is trying to sort out a problem that they don’t even come close to understanding.
‘People are dying in more numbers than we’ve seen in any part of the world at any time in history. We are not managing this.’
The taskforce was set up by the SNP in 2019. The group – made up of about 20 drug-use ‘experts’, including academics, policy advisers, police officers and prosecution specialists – advises the Scottish Government and public bodies.
However, the team has been criticised for its ‘right-on’ approach.
In one of its first reports, it declared that addicts face ‘social stigma’ that is as bad as ‘sexism and racism’. It said taking drugs should no longer be frowned upon because ‘many people use a range of substances without harm’.
And it added that abstinence should no longer be the end goal of treatment.
In January, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon pledged to do more to reduce the death toll, which she branded a ‘national disgrace’, and appointed a new Minister for Drugs Policy, Angela Constance.
Earlier this year, we told how a controversial scheme in which heroin is given to addicts to manage their craving was being rolled out nationwide. We also revealed a pilot in Glasgow that would see alcoholics given free ‘doses’ of booze to manage their drinking.
The Scottish Government said there was £100 million of extra funding to expand rehabilitation facilities.
It added: ‘The Drug Deaths Taskforce – whose membership includes those with lived experience and their families – has funded more than 30 innovative projects and ten research projects to reduce harm and improve and save lives.
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Answers
1 to 11 of 11
do they just have to press the hash key ?
05:53 Mon 12th Jul 2021
//what a load of guff//
not guff Maggie, unless the Scottish government themselves made it up?
https:/
but it’s hardly news - the initiative is nearly 6 months old.
not guff Maggie, unless the Scottish government themselves made it up?
https:/
but it’s hardly news - the initiative is nearly 6 months old.
1 to 11 of 11
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