Alcohol Policy UK

New direction towards alcohol for Cumbria DAAT

A plan to tackle substance abuse in Cumbria is now focusing more clearly on alcohol, with police admitting drink is linked to a large amount of violent crime. The Cumbria Drug and Alcohol Action Team (DAAT) is placing a higher priority on problems with alcohol after previously concentrating on drugs.

Assistant Chief Constable Neil Rhodes spoke about the DAAT plan at a meeting of Cumbria Police Authority, the body overseeing the county’s police force. He said:

“Generally, it is becoming far more focussed on the perils of alcohol. In the past it has been focussed almost exclusively on drugs. There is a new direction.

We recognise that alcohol underpins a lot of the problems we have in relation to violent crime. Domestic abuse and violence always has strong themes of alcohol running through it. If we are going to address offenders by any other means than enforcement, we need partner agencies (to be involved). Treatment is something DAAT is very good at.”  News & Star

Cumbria DAAT's Pooled Treatment Budget allocation was £2.8M this year (all PTB allocations here) but - as is the case for all English DATs - it is all ring-fenced for primary drug users and not for alcohol treatment, so it will be interesting to see how the new plan is funded.

Wirral sets up screeening and brief interventions in 56 pharmacies

Wirral PCT has launched Screening and Brief Interventions (SBIs) in 56 of the district's pharmacies, aiming to have all 86 covered as part of the 2007-2010 local alcohol strategy. The developments follow SBIs being set up across GP surgeries in Wirral last year, a setting well suited for SBIs and supported by national guidance. In pharmacy settings, people will be screened by being asked to fill in a short questionnaire and being provided with advice, information or onward referral as appropriate. Follow-up telephone calls will also be made to assess how clients may have responded to the intervention or to deliver any further support.

Wirral has amongst the highest rates for alcohol misuse in the country, with over half of men in Merseyside regualrly drinking more than the reccomended guidelines. According to the Liverpool Daily Post, Andy Mills, head of partnership and engagement at Wirral PCT, said:

“Wirral is leading the way nationally, and many pharmacists have already started running routine alcohol screenings. Wirral PCT is now looking to get all pharmacies involved in providing this service.”

Trusts across the country are increasingly commisisoning SBIs as part of local approaches to reducing alcohol misuse, particularly in primary care, A&E and criminal justice settings. Recently a guidance framework for commissioners was relesaed by the NHS, the Alcohol Primary Care Service Framework.

Alcohol Primary Care Service Framework released

The NHS have released Primary Care Service Framework: Alcohol Services in Primary Care, designed to support commissioners, practitioners and providers in setting up alcohol interventions in primary care.

The document is likely to be welcomed across the country as increasing numbers of PCTs and local authorities are setting up Screening and Brief Intervention programmes within primary care settings, particularly with General Practitioners and in cases other settings such as pharmacies.

Previously there had been no specific frameworks to help local commissioners and practitioners set up such programmes, despite national guidance such as Models of Care for Alcohol Misusers (MoCAM) and Alcohol Misuse Interventions: Guidance on developing a local programme of improvement. The Alcohol Services in Primary Care Framework may be particularly useful in helping commissioners and practitioners:

• Scope and define suitable services
• Identify key agendas and frameworks
• Identify suitable evidence bases and local need
• Identify service objectives and intended health outcomes
• Set up suitable governance, monitoring and evaluation arrangements
• Identify suitable contract management
• Identify suitable review, variation and recommissioning process
• Find supporting documents, guidance, definitions and Read codes

Where commissioners may still be stuck is around pricing of services with no recommended or nationally agreed prices.

The new framework comes as part of 6 new Primary Care Service Frameworks falling within objectives of providing enhanced, localised service provision within the Practice Based Commissioning agenda.

Best Bar None schemes now total 90

In 2007 an agreement was reached between Greater Manchester Police, the Home Office and BII, the professional body for the licensed retail sector, to develop Best Bar None (BBN) nationally. An independent board has now been formed and is currently chaired by Lord Rupert Redesdale. BII's role in Best Bar None is to help and foster future development of the scheme.

The number of BBN schemes is now running at 90, with the Chief Executive John McNamara further promoting their development, an article in the Morning Advertiser reports. However McNamara was keen to highlight that schemes should not become mandatory, and that the emphasis should be on local schemes adapting a bottom up approach. The article also highlighted the paperwork necessary for BBN participation was also being reduced, one of the concerns highlighted by some local authorities regarding the scheme.

However more serious questions have been raised in the past relating to evaluating the effectiveness of the schemes, which have been suggested in some cases as costly and time consuming. An evaluation of Croydon's BBN scheme showed that while some positive partnership outcomes were apparent, a number of issues meant effectiveness was difficult to demonstrate.

For further information on BBN and examples of schemes across the country see here

To visit the official BBN site see here

Jobs: 3 alcohol health promotion posts in Camden -18th of June deadline

Three alcohol Health Promotion Speciailists are to be recruited in the London Borough of Camden to deliver improvements in health and the reduction of inequalities relating to alcohol misuse. The posts wil lead on developing prevention and intervention campaigns, help co-ordinate education and support programmes and work with council colleagues and the alcohol industry to promote sensible drinking.

There are to be three specific areas for each of the jobs:

1) Alcohol and young adults
2) Adults and the workplace
3) Alcohol and children 

For further details please see the NHS site here

The deadlinr for applications is 18^th June 2008

Successful applicants selected for interview will be notified on Monday 23^rd June 2008

.

Interview Date: 26^th June 2008

1 in 3 councils expect to use Alcohol Disorder Zones

A survey carried out by the Local Government Association (LGA) has found varying levels of expected use of Alcohol Disorder Zones (ADZs) by local authorities. In a press release from the LGA, it was announced:

The survey of 182 councils in England and Wales, carried out by TNS for the Local Government Association, found that 33% were not going to adopt ADZs, 34% were going to and 33% were still to decide. The survey also revealed that almost a quarter of councils (24%) said they expected to recoup the costs of operating ADZs through the charging regime, while 41% said they did not.

However there has been significant scepticism over the expected benefits of ADZs, with warnings over the impact coming from both the media and representatives of the night time economies, such as from a senior business leader in Liverpool.

Alcohol Concern report: The extent of local alcohol commissioning?

Alcohol Concern have released The Poor Relation - has the emphasis on 'localism' really improved alcohol commissioning, which sets out the findings from Freedom of Information requests asking PCTs for data on a number of key alcohol spend indicators including:

• Spend on alcohol treatment  for 07/08 (and whether the £15 million Choosing Health money was used locally or not)
• Data on waiting times for accessing alcohol treatment
• The percentage of dependant drinkers in treatment
• Whether trusts had any information about hazardous, harmful and dependant drinkers

Nearly 40% of the trusts were not able to return the questionnaire but the report provides a compelling analysis of the extent of investment into alcohol treatment and of the changes to commissioning structures and the devolving of decisions to local level.  The report points out that 'MoCAM and other Department of Health related guidance have not improved alcohol commissioning or treatment provision at the local level.'  There is still a 'postcode lottery' concerning alcohol treatment, with huge variations in spend and provision across the country.

  The report recommends that:

• the local Pooled Treatment Budgets (for drug treatment) should include the funding of alcohol treatment where required in addition to existing PCT or local authority alcohol spend
• the Department of Health should set an optimum level of access for alcohol treatment, reducing the current national average of 1 in 18 to around 1 in 7
• the Department of Health should consider requiring local commissioners to reduce alcohol treatment waiting times to those for drug treatment, since alcohol treatment data must now be submitted to the National Drug Treatment Monitoring System (NDTMS)
• PCTs should make better cases for investment in alcohol treatment
• Strategic Health Authorities should ensure their local PCTs are meeting local alcohol treatment needs through key agendas and commissioning structures including Standards for Better Health

National Indicator set definitions released

The definitions for the National Indicators have been released by the Department for Communities and Local Government.  Definitions are provided for the 198 National Indicators, 185 of which came into force on the 1st of April 2008.  Local Strategic Partnerships should by now know which indicators they will set as key improvement targets (up to 35) as part of their Local Area Agreements (LAAs).

The new national indicators will be the only means of measuring national priorities that have been set  by the Government.  For alcohol, the key indicators are as follows:

• NI 39 Alcohol-harm related hospital admission rates
• NI 41 Perceptions of drunk or rowdy behaviour as a problem
• NI 115 Substance misuse by young people

A further indicator is associated with alcohol:

• NI 20 Assault with injury crime rate

However alcohol factors into many of the other indicators, with at least another 50 having a direct link with alcohol misuse.  Local partnerships are urged to consider the role of alcohol within their LAAs and key improvement targets. 

For further information on LAAs and the new frameworks for Local Strategic Partnerships see this overview and Alcohol Concern's LAA Factsheet here.

Lancashire to take more regional approach to local alcohol strategy

Community Safety Partnerships in Lancashire are joining up to form an alcohol strategy that covers five boroughs across the region, according to a report in the Lancashire Telegraph. The non-executive director of East Lancs PCT, Ian Clements, who will chair the strategy steering group, said:

We have all agreed that taking action to reduce the harm caused by alcohol should be a priority as part of a wider health inequalities plan to save a million years of life by 2011.

We have realised that across East Lancashire the majority of problems we face in relation to alcohol are broadly similar and we therefore need to pool our resources to drive forward collectively.

The more regional approach will be followed closely - it's more usual for boroughs or districts adopt their own local alcohol strategies. However last year's updated national strategy Safe. Sensible. Social outlined that regional Government Offices would have more responsibility to support local strategies.

Bluffer's guide to local alcohol strategies

So you’ve been asked to write an alcohol harm reduction strategy by the end of March, but:

a) you haven’t got any time to do it, and

b) you don’t really know where to start. 

Clearly, it’s an impossible task. Don’t panic!! Help is at hand.  Follow this guide and you might just get out of jail free.

Download the Bluffer's guide to local alcohol strategies