Published: Thursday, 18th March, 2010 6:50am

£1m to help West Fife blitz the boozers

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Joy Patrick, far right, with other officials at the launch.

JIM Tolson MSP is supporting a new £1 million initiative to help alcohol abusers in West Fife to get off the demon drink and confront an increasing problem.

The Dunfermline West MSP was at the city's Vine Church on Friday to back a new partnership approach as alcohol problems continue to escalate.

The Drug and Alcohol Project (DAPL), NHS Fife addiction services and Fife Intensive Rehabilitation and Substance Misuse Team (FIRST) have teamed up to provide a comprehensive approach to alcohol treatment, counselling and rehab.

Joy Patrick, from DAPL, said, "Alcohol is a bigger problem now than drugs and it's costing a lot of families a lot of heartache and a great deal of money to the country.

"It's legal so people tend to over-indulge and, from a Scottish perspective, everything seems to revolve around alcohol."

She added, "This money is a huge help.

"We've always been in Central and North East Fife but this allows us to provide services throughout the Kingdom, particularly in West Fife where there are very few services.

"It's a real breakthrough."

Mr Tolson said, "The alcohol problem in West Fife is bad - I don't believe it's worse than anywhere else - but the issue is fairly significant.

"These organisations do a lot of good work in Fife but they could do a lot more if they had the funding and resources to expand.

"Hopefully this will help them wean those with problems off alcohol and reduce the adverse impact alcohol is having in our communities."

He continued, "Quite apart from the detrimental effect on health, there are wider problems of vandalism, theft and assault that are associated with alcohol.

"There are also staff in hospitals who are verbally and sometimes physically challenged by people who have over-consumed.

"I'm very concerned with the stories I've heard and they are second hand, from nurses and doctors, and I would like to spend time in the hospital to see for myself some of the issues."

With the help of the government cash, it's hoped the partnership can provide services to deal with an increasing demand resulting from alcohol screening and interventions from GPs, A&E staff, antenatal teams and other medical professionals.

Ms Patrick said, "This is ground-breaking as it brings three services together for the first time.

"They'll go to addiction services for support and they can do detox at home, they can come to DAPL for counselling and go to FIRST for rehab and to help them find other interests."

She continued, "Alcohol problems are becoming more prevalent and we're getting more referrals.

"Before it would be people with heroin or cocaine problems but the majority now are alcohol users or those people who are affected by someone's alcohol use.

"We do have a young person's service, for under-18s, and the next plan is to roll that out to West Fife too.

"We've actually got people as young as eight, not necessarily on drink or drugs, who come to us for support because a family member is struggling with alcohol.

"It can affect far more than just the person with the alcohol problem."