The Parliamentary Information Office reported in March the launch of a new £1 million fund to give local communities the tools they need to tackle binge drinking and has been following distribution of the funding
The new £1 million fund to enable local communities to tackle binge and underage drinking was announced in March by the Government's Champion for Active Safer Communities, Baroness Newlove.
Figures show an ever-growing cost of alcohol to the NHS which currently stands at £2.7bn a year, including £1bn on accident and emergency services. £2.7bn equates to £90 for every taxpayer in the country. This is part of a wider cost to society from alcohol of between £17 billion and £22 billion per annum. In 2010/11 alone there were 200,000 hospital admissions with a primary alcohol-related diagnosis, 40 per cent higher than in 2002/03. The number of patients admitted with acute intoxification has more than doubled to 18,500 since 2002/03. According to a 2010 Home Office Impact Assessment, alcohol-related crime is estimated to cost £8billion - £13billion a year.
In her most recent report, Baroness Newlove set out the importance of tackling the damage associated with problem drinking and announced her intention to give up to ten areas in England the money and extra resources for projects to make their neighbourhoods safer and better places to live. The report also highlighted the good practice already out there, such as the community based projects based in East Belfast, Derry, Maidstone, and Newquay that are successfully dealing with problem drinking head on.
On 14 May 2012, Baroness Newlove announced ten areas that would receive funding available to local authorities to spend over a two-year period with each receiving in the region of £45,000 per year. The ten areas that received this funding were:
- Bury, Greater Manchester
- Chelmsford, Essex
- Cornwall
- County Durham
- Lincoln, Lincolnshire
- Maidstone, Kent
- Moseley, Birmingham
- Newcastle
- Shropshire
- Wakefield, West Yorkshire
These new grassroot projects are genuine community coalitions of local police, community activists, local authorities and retailers. Each area has identified the issues that are of greatest concern to their communities and have developed local solutions to test out ideas that can be built on to help transform their neighbourhoods.
The ten successful projects include rural communities and town centres, local parks and residential areas and involve partnerships with for example; local schools, youth centres and hospitals.
The ten areas are:
- Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent
- Croydon, London
- Exeter, Devon
- Great Yarmouth, Norfolk
- Horsham, West Sussex
- Lancaster, Lancashire
- North Tyneside
- Nottingham
- Reading, Berkshire
- St Helens, Merseyside
"I am convinced that the solution to underage and binge drinking and the crime and anti-social behaviour that comes in its wake can only be found when everyone, those affected and those paid to stamp it out, come together with total resolve to tackle it head-on. It's not about huge amounts of money either, some of the best most effective approaches involve pooling resources, sharing information and improving existing communications.
"These ten areas, like the original ten, have impressed me with a local plan involving community activists, police, health workers and the retail trade and I want other communities facing similar problems to learn from their innovative example.
"For too long, a small minority has impacted adversely on our happiness, health and security. We have to change society's tolerance to this unacceptable behaviour and the fight-back will be sown in these grassroots partnerships.
"Their success will be helped by the range of community powers available to them through new Government legislation and I shall be mentoring them and encouraging them throughout."
The ten areas form part of a national network of communities working to tackle binge and underage drinking and anti social behaviour which Baroness Newlove will be supporting, including the ten areas announced in May that are sharing a £1million fund and the 'Newlove Neighbourhoods'.
This network will celebrate and support all the hard work that communities are putting in, allowing them to share ideas and best practice across the country, and together, solve common problems and identify the red tape holding them back.
Among the ten projects that will receive funding are:
- Horsham, Sussex, the local youth services and the YMCA are developing a project for young people to design and present their own 'mocktails' - non alcoholic cocktails. The project will not only allow local young people to learn about the problems of binge drinking, but will also offer them a chance to develop employment skills.
- Great Yarmouth is supporting a community project called The Den Life Changes project, where local people support young people and their families to turn their lives around from drug and alcohol abuse. They will also roll out a mentoring project based on the principles of work at The Den.
- In Nottingham, a local charity is developing a binge drinking awareness project in three city centre schools. The project would be aimed at years 10/11 and include drama workshops, an art campaign, and a health education programme about alcohol, which can then be taken forward in these and neighbouring schools.
- North Tyneside are building on a project run by the local Primary Care Trust which employs an A&E Link Worker to deal with the issue of alcohol related hospital admissions of young people. This project will establish a package of support with local services for young people including mentoring.
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