05 November 2004
Many problem drug users face a postcode lottery trying to find treatment services, the Audit Commission said this week.
Its report, Drug misuse 2004, reducing the local impact, says drug users are often let down by complex partnerships at local level, which do not provide adequate support.
Many of these partnerships had failed to demonstrate that they could manage their resources effectively. Some were sitting on more than 40% of their 2003/04 adult pooled treatment budget.
The variation in local drug partnership spending raises doubts about 'value for money', the report found, with demographically similar areas varying considerably in the proportion of their budget spent on the main tiers of drug treatment.
The commission said an examination of local treatment plans did not explain the investment imbalance.
Audit Commission director Zoë Billington said more needed to be done to 'stop the fall from the recovery path'. Some 34% of drug users leaving treatment drop out in the first 12 weeks, moving on with a lack of support and slipping back into old behaviour.
Billington said the taxpayer was forced to foot the bill for treatments that were often started repeatedly by drug addicts before recovery. 'One of the key messages in this report is that it is time to treat the person and not the drug problem,' she said.
The National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse welcomed the report, saying that it had started to refocus its efforts to ensure 'that the £219m funding for treatment announced last month is used to best effect'.
An NTA spokeswoman defended the local partnerships. She said: 'Drug misuse is a complex area with a wide range of interested parties and it does need that level of partnership to ensure all voices are heard.'
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