6. Statement by the Deputy Minister for Mental Health and Well-being: Update on the Substance Misuse Delivery Plan 2019-22

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:59 pm on 25 January 2022.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of James Evans James Evans Conservative 4:59, 25 January 2022

I want to thank the Deputy Minister for her statement. I welcome your commitment into this very important area, and I want to put on the record my commitment to ensure that we do all we can to help people to recover from substance misuse. We need to move to a place where we treat the person, not the offence, where we give everybody a second chance and where treating drug and alcohol addiction, and not criminalising people, will lead to community safety and stronger communities.

Deputy Minister, in your statement, you've laid out the additional funding going into the work of rehabilitation, and I was wondering where this additional money will be spent, and will we be seeing more rehabilitation centres opening across Wales? And with the additional moneys going into this area, how will you be ensuring that the additional moneys are being spent in the right places?

You also raised the point that drug misuse deaths have gone down, and that must be welcome, but I agree with you, Minister, when you say that the number of alcohol-specific deaths is a cause for concern. So, Minister, can you outline any specific strategies that you have for addressing the growing numbers of the Welsh population that are living with alcohol dependencies, because of the wider problems that that causes for their health?

In the statement, you also talked about the link between homelessness and substance misuse. Deputy Minister, with some areas of Wales unable to build houses, how can we ensure that people who need to be housed can get the support they need and that good-quality housing when local authorities and residential social landlords—? Their housing stocks are under considerable pressure, and if we don't have the houses, we can't get people off the streets to get the support they need to recover from addiction.

And finally, Deputy Minister, you mentioned previously about Rehab Cymru, and I wonder if you can outline some of the settings that they're going to offer, and the three settings that are in Wales—can you tell me where they are and are they going to be residential or day care? And to conclude, I want to thank you for your statement today, I think there's some really good progress being made in this area, and I always give credit where credit is due, so congratulations on that, and anything I can do to help you in the future with this, I'm very happy to do so. Diolch, Deputy Llywydd.