Staffordshire Drug and Alcohol Action Team and its partners are committed to both reducing the number of young people who develop problems with drugs and alcohol, and for those that do providing high quality treatment services to ensure they are supported fully and quickly, in order that they can overcome their problems and go on to lead productive lives.  As you can see from the Young Peoples Substance Misuse Plan (insert link here) we commit nearly £700,000 annually to support these services for these vulnerable young people.

We do this by:

• Funding high quality education materials and working with Schools Improvement Division to make sure children have access to the most up to date information about drugs and alcohol. The work we support teachers and schools staff with ensures that consistent messages are given, using only accredited materials and resources, and also ensures teachers know what to do in the event that a young person displays indications that they may have a problem that needs further support.

• Funding a comprehensive training programme to ensure that professionals who work with children and young people on a day to day basis, including Connexions Personal Advisers, Youth Service Staff, School Nurses, Looked After Childrens workers and Vulnerable childrens workers (amongst others) are equipped with the skills and knowledge to ensure that they can identify and assess young people who may be developing a problem, and know who to contact for specialist support should they need it.

• We also fund specialist screening and assessment teams within the Youth Offending Team, to ensure those young people engaged with the Youth Justice system are assessed and referred quickly to specialist services where necessary to support them. The links between drugs and crime are well documented and this process aims to interrupt that pattern.

• If a young person develops more complex problems, more specialist support may be needed to help support them. To this end we spend nearly £500,000 annually in Staffordshire on treatment services for young people. We have recently openly tendered the service to ensure we have the very best services available to young people in Staffordshire, that offer good value for money and proven results in helping young people stay drug free. These services work closely with our education workers and staff in universal childrens and young peoples services to make sure young people are supported in a holistic way.  We also recognise that families and carers need extra support and information to help them cope with and support a young person with a problem with drugs or alcohol, and to this end we also commission a county wide Parent/Carer support service, to make sure the progress a young person makes in treatment is further supported by working with their home environment.