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In response to the LGA's review of progress two years into its 10-year plan to cut drug-related crime and save lives, "From harm to hope", the APCC's Joint Leads on Addictions and Substance Misuse, Joy Allen and David Sidwick, recently said: 

“We welcome this timely and important report and strongly endorse its key recommendations and findings.

“We would echo the LGA’s positive evaluation of the “harm to hope” approach as delivered through local Combating Drugs Partnerships, a number of which are chaired by Police and Crime Commissioners. We also strongly support the call for multi-year funding for drug treatment, which is one of the most effective ways of cutting crime and saving the much greater expenditures of public money needed to pick up the pieces later on. We urge the new government to build on the positive legacy of the harm to hope work. 

“One of the weaknesses of drug strategy implementation which is rightly picked up in this report has been the insufficient weight on prevention and a generational shift in attitudes to drugs. We hope this point will register with government, for example as it develops plans for prevention partnerships and for the Young Futures programme.

“We also share the LGA’s concerns about the threat of synthetic drugs and support their call for improved early warning systems, alongside other measures, such as further roll out of the anti-overdose drug naloxone.  As well as synthetic opioids, there is also growing alarm among PCCs about the prevalence of contaminated vapes, often containing dangerous synthetic cannabinoids such as Spice, and we’d like to see more being done to raise awareness of these risks, particularly among young people."

Notes

• Joy Allen is joint APCC lead on Addictions and Substance and Misuse, and PCC for Durham.
• David Sidwick is joint APCC lead on Addictions and Substance and Misuse, and PCC for Dorset.
• The LGA's report, "Two Years on: a progress review of 'From harm to hope: A 10-year drugs plan to cut crime and save lives'" can be found here.