THE controversial ‘fix room’ for heroin addicts to legally inject will be sited in one of Glasgow’s most deprived areas, social work chiefs have comfirmed.
The plan for the UK’s first safer injecting facility, a centre where users can take drugs bought on the street to consume under supervision, are currently on hold because a law change is needed before it can go ahead.
In the meantime the city’s health and social care partnership has agreed to proceed with plans for a Heroin Assisted Treatment (HAT) centre, where doctors can prescribe a small number of drug users who have exhausted all other options.
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Council chiefs let it slip last week that this is to be sited in Calton, to the East of the city centre. However council Social Work chief David Williams told a meeting of the partnership that this meant the site ¬ currently a homeless health centre ¬ is also the preferred location for the fix room.
“The services will eventually be co-located, “ he said. “People can assume that would also be a good location for the Safer Drug Consumption Facility, assuming the legislation allows it to progress.”
Plans to locate of the proposed HAT service in Calton’s Hunter Street, were revealed in a paper about reshaping homelessness provision in the city, and have cause anxiety because local residents had not been warned about them. Calton is one of the most deprived parts of Scotland, with the highest level of child poverty in the country.
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Mr Williams told the meeting the local community would be consulted about both developments, but said it would be wrong to suggest the site was not a strong favourite with planners. “It would be disingenuous not to be honest and say this is our preferred location,” he said. “It has taken at least a year to identify this site.
“We need to reassure people, but this is not a reckless or fly by night development. An awful lot of thought has gone into this.,, we have to nail our colours to the mast.”
Councillors said there was already concern about a lack of consultation over the planned HAT centre. Calton councillor Jennifer Layden said it was unfortunate the site had been named without warning local people first while Baillie Ade Aibinyu objected that the decision appeared to already be “set in stone”.
Chief Social Work Officer Susanne Miller, said the venue would also house the safer injecting facility, and said the location made sense because the client group would be similar to existing users of the homelessness health centre. Heroin assisted treatment is legal, but the premises to be used must be named in order for the Home Office to inspect the site before a service can be registered, she said.
Chair of the HSCP Councillor Mhairi Hunter said plans for persuading the UK Government to support the fix room plan had suffered a setback with the resignation of the former home secretary. “We had hoped to persuade Amber Rudd - we were trying to target her but she’s out the door,” Ms Hunter said. She said health and social care officials were now trying to build a relationship with new home secretary Sajid Javid MP.
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Councilor Layden said she would be writing to the chair of the Health and Social Care Partnership to ask how local residents would be consulted about locating the HAT service and potentially the safer injecting facility in their community.
Green Councillor Kim Long said she was “very frustrated” that plans had leaked out in the homelessness paper, after the partnership had had lengthy discussions about how to communicate the proposals to the public.
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