I was fascinated by Tim Leighton’s interview with Wulf, particularly since I consider these two individuals to be two of the most knowledgeable people I have met working in the field. Here, Tim reflects on government policy and actions, and how they have impacted on the addiction recovery field.
Government & Recovery [8’17”]
Wulf asks Tim what he considers enables recovery on the one hand, and hinders it on the other. Tim emphasises that he believes both in grassroots activism, and in an accountable government providing beneficial conditions for a civilised society. He goes on to describe examples of how government policy has hindered recovery over the past 30 years.
The Conservatives developed the first drug strategy, Tackling Drugs to Build a Better Britain, which became an attack on drug-related crime. In the following years, drug problems were treated more as a criminal justice issue, rather than a health issue. People began to be placed on opioid substitution (often methadone) treatment programmes in very large numbers, and often not helped to move on from ‘being parked’ on a powerful sedative drug and the resulting lifestyle that it created.
[TL Note: I am not criticising or blaming people who choose to use opioid substitution treatment in their recovery—it’s the quality of services at this period that I am commenting on.]
David Cameron’s Coalition government were attracted by the ‘recovery’ word and after being told that the 12-Step Fellowships worked (and were free) decided that we’ll use them to get everyone abstinent from drugs. This didn’t work either.
A ridiculously ineffective government alcohol strategy was also developed, one which provided no resources for services, recommended all the approaches without evidence and none of those with, and put most of the responsibility for addressing alcohol-related problems on the drink industry and the individual person.
Tim the describes how the huge promise of Dame Carol Black’s two recent reports are risking being squandered by government. Much funding is already being wasted, or put towards traditional services who have a tendency to provide what is often called ‘spray-on recovery’. He describes some large organisations hoovering up funding by bidding at unrealistically low levels and often then sub-contracting to organisations who can’t help people with the money provided.