John Penrose

Conservative Party | Weston-super-Mare

Two Key Government Ministers Support Central Principle of Weston MP's Anti-Drugs Campaign

Weston-super-Mare MP John Penrose today won Government endorsement from two key Ministers for one of the central principles behind his long-running Cleaner Weston campaign against the problems of drug addiction in Weston.

In Parliament today Mr Penrose asked Ms Primarolo, Minister of State for Public Health and Bristol MP, to endorse the principle that organisations which send drug addicts for treatment in towns like Weston-super-Mare retain responsibility for their care throughout their entire course of treatment and rehabilitation. Until now, many addicts have been sent for the first phase of their treatment in Weston and then abandoned by the agency that referred them, meaning they are effectively dumped on local health and social services.

Replying for the Government, Ms Primarolo said, "I absolutely agree with the Honourable Gentleman ....... I intend to follow this through because a treatment plan is an important part of the process in making sure individuals are supported......I am going to speak to my colleagues in Ministry of Justice specifically in regard to referral through probation services and secondly working with the NTA (National Treatment Agency), the LA (Local Authority) and the local partnership, make sure we address other referrals to the area in the way he is suggesting, because that is the only way to ensure that the treatment is delivered and worked and I commend the Honourable Gentleman for working so hard on this issue for such a long period of time."

This comment follows a similar declaration made by Government Minister Maria Eagle MP who is Dawn Primarolo's opposite number in the Ministry of Justice. In a recent letter responding to earlier meetings with John Penrose she said that the Probation Service had strengthened its rules on preventing convicted addicts from being dumped in towns like Weston in September 2007, but that some probation areas were still not complying with the new approach. She pledged firmer action to solve the problem and promised that the Director of Probation would take personal responsibility for improving performance. 

Ms Eagle's commitment is particularly important, since Mr Penrose has figures which show that 110 convicted addicts were incorrectly sent to Weston by the probation service in 2006/07, and 112 more since April 2007.

The support of these two Ministers represents a substantial victory for local MP John Penrose, who launched the Cleaner Weston campaign in 2004 with this anti-dumping principle as one of its central aims.

John Penrose said, "I'm delighted that the Government is responding to this issue at last. To often the people who refer addicts to Weston, whether they're in probation services, health trusts or social services, fail to inform local agencies that they're sending someone for treatment in Weston, fail to check that the treatment is progressing satisfactorily once they arrive, and then fail to take any appropriate steps to continue an addict’s care when they complete the Weston stage of their recovery, even if they have relapsed and have been expelled from their treatment programme. That's not fair on the addicts, and it's not fair on local people who have to live with the crime and disruption which results from it either.”

These Ministerial comments follow yesterday's highly critical report into the Government's drugs policy from the UK Drug Policy Commission on the care provided to drug addicts in prisons which concluded that the standard of healthcare and support for prisoners with drug problems falls well below acceptable minimum standards in too many cases.