National Alcohol Strategy (Hansard, 18 June 2002)

§ 2. Nick Harvey (North Devon)
When he expects to publish a national alcohol strategy. [59119]

§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Ms Hazel Blears)
The NHS plan makes clear our commitment to implement a strategy to address alcohol misuse by 2004, and we remain on target.

§ Nick Harvey
I thank the Minister for her reply, but during the four years in which the alcohol strategy has been imminent, the Government have pursued a number of other priorities. Does she accept that, during that time alcohol services on the ground have been visibly disintegrating? Is she aware that, in my constituency, we have one long-term counsellor and two suppliers of specialist accommodation to cover a population of more than 150,000? Does she share my concern that 39,000 admissions annually to accident and emergency departments result from alcohol misuse, that it is causing untold misery in the home through jobs lost and that the Treasury is losing revenue because of those lost jobs? Will she now commit herself to a timetable for the strategy and make absolutely certain that there is no slippage on it? Does she accept that alcohol misuse has been wrongly falling down the list of priorities?

§ Ms Blears
I think that I made it clear to the hon. Gentleman that we have set out a timetable in the NHS plan to implement the strategy by 2004, and that we are on target to meet that timetable. I certainly do not accept that services are falling apart. Primary care trusts spend about £95 million a year on commissioning alcohol treatment services, but this is not just a matter of treatment services; it is crucially also about prevention, and therefore we have been investing an extra £23 million on substance misuse education in our schools—drugs, alcohol and tobacco—to try to send out the message that it is better to prevent those problems from occurring in the first place. We have also sent out a very effective sensible drinking message to try to prevent some of the binge drinking, which is clearly a problem.
I recognise the fact that accident and emergency departments are caused tremendous problems by people who turn up drunk. That is why we have a zero tolerance policy towards any kind of violence against anyone in the NHS. We encourage prosecutions against people who turn up drunk and assault people in accident and emergency departments. Prison sentences have been imposed recently on people who have behaved in that unacceptable way. Clearly, there is a problem with alcohol misuse in this country, but it is not simply a matter of having strategies; it is about tackling the problem on the ground.

§ Mr. Kelvin Hopkins (Luton, North)
Does my hon. Friend agree that alcohol causes far more damage to people's lives and the economy than illicit drugs and that it is implicated in a wide range of crimes? Will she contact our right hon. Friend the Home Secretary about the impact of alcohol on crime? Does she also agree that a more urgent strategy than she suggests is desirable?

§ Ms Blears
My hon. Friend is right: it is not a matter of action against drugs or action on alcohol; it is a matter of tackling both issues in our communities and in our society. The Home Office has issued an action plan on alcohol-related crime, and the Department of Health is fully engaged in those issues, too. It is also a question of treatment. About 500 treatment centres in this country concentrate not just on drug treatment but on alcohol 139 treatment. A strong case exists for bringing together some of our policies on substance misuse. My hon. Friend makes some extremely constructive points, and I reassure him that the Department of Health takes these issues extremely seriously. That is why we want prevention and treatment, especially in respect of the misuse of alcohol and binge drinking by young people, for whom it has been shown that brief interventions by health professionals can have an impact. We are currently training general practitioners and nurses in those brief interventions to get people out of the cycle of binge drinking—

§ Mr. Speaker
Order. I think the hon. Gentleman gets the point.

§ Mr. David Tredinnick (Bosworth)
The hon. Lady spoke of the importance of strategies on the ground and gave a long list of policies, but she excluded complementary and alternative medicine, which must surprise the House given the effectiveness of complementary therapies in reducing the problems of those who suffer from alcohol abuse and drugs problems in particular. No doubt she will have received reports of how therapeutic touch and the use of herbal remedies can reduce the time that it takes a heroin addict to come off heroin by about 50 per cent. Many clinics up and down the country now use these different treatments. When will the Government put their weight behind the range of therapies that are available and make sure that they are available not just for middle-class people but for those who are very badly off and who are addicted?

§ Ms Blears
Question Time would not be the same without an intervention from the hon. Gentleman. I shall not be taking up what was perhaps an offer of therapeutic touch, but I shall consider it in due course.
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point: complementary therapies can be useful for a whole range of conditions, and he has raised these issues on many occasions. He will be aware that work is ongoing in the Department to consider the effectiveness of complementary and alternative therapies to see whether we can provide a wider choice for people, in relation not just to drug and alcohol problems but to a whole range of conditions. It is important that the research is ongoing, and we will have an opportunity later this afternoon to discuss further issues in this area.

§ Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Highgate)
Despite what the Government have done and are doing through the national alcohol strategy, there is a perceptible belief among those who have to deal with the victims of alcohol abuse, day in and day out, that such abuse is not as high up the list of Government priorities as they would wish. Is more than one Department still engaged in the strategy? Special attention must be given to the increasing problem of teenage alcohol abusers.

§ Ms Blears
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that the strategy must engage many Departments, because it is not simply about picking up the pieces through long-term health treatment: crucially, it also involves education and the Home Office. I assure her that consultation on the strategy is already under way across the relevant 140 Departments. We hope to come up with a strategy that does not simply consider one aspect of the problem but considers it across the community.
There is a particular problem with young people—my hon. Friend will be aware of the chief medical officer's recent report on the increase in liver cirrhosis, especially among young women. We therefore need to direct our education policies in a much more targeted and focused way to make sure that we reach the young people who are increasingly the victims of binge drinking, which, in some cases, is out of control.