My first drugs work post was as an HIV Prevention Outreach Worker in Liverpool in the late 1980's. This was where I absorbed the core values on which all my work - with services and strategy - rests. These are that -
- Successful social or political outcomes depend on successful individual outcomes;
- Individuals and communities need to have the opportunity to take responsibility for their own substance use problems
- The only rational basis for policy is the reduction of drug related harm
In 2001 I became Community Safety Manager with responsibility for Substance Use (by any other name a DAT Co-ordinator would smell as sweet ...) for one of the most dynamic and exciting local authorities in London. Since then I have also held a national senior management role for the largest social care charity working in substance misuse in the UK, and worked on a number of independent and freelance projects.
I have published a number of articles and papers (some of which can be found on this website) and have spoken at many conferences internationally and in the UK. My freelance portfolio currently includes work for the community benefit and voluntary sectors, Local Authorities, PCTs and major national campaigning charities.
My main professional interests are
- The dynamic between national and local policy making and implementation
- Choice and plurality in substance use services (including individualised budgets)
- Mainstreaming of drugs interventions and spend
- Understanding the individual experience of health and social care for drug users
- Utilising different and imaginative techniques - such as simulations and process redesign