Citywide welcomes commitments in Programme for Government

16 Jan 2025

Citywide welcomes commitment by the incoming Government to health-led approach on drugs and investment in services. 

Group calls for immediate re-establishment of Oireachtas Committee on Drugs

Citywide Drugs Crisis Campaign has welcomed the commitment in the draft Programme for Government to take a health-led approach to the issue of possession of drugs and, as a core part of this approach, to invest through the Drug Task Forces in Community Drug Services.

Citywide also welcomes the commitment to expand vital life-saving harm reduction services i.e. mobile injecting facilities and availability of naloxone, as part of a strategy to combat Ireland’s shocking level of drug-related deaths. “Along with an expansion of the services, the commitment to a major awareness campaign will help to challenge the drug-related stigma that is at the root of so much of the drug-related harm in our society,” Anna Quigley Citywide’s Coordinator said.

In this context, Citywide has called on the incoming Government to immediately re-establish the Oireachtas Committee on Drugs to allow it to finish its vital work.

“The Oireachtas Committee on Drugs was established in June 2024 to consider the 36 recommendations of the Citizen’s Assembly on Drugs. The Citizens’ Assembly – which was set up in 2023 in line with a commitment in the last Programme for Government – represented the most comprehensive and widespread examination of the drugs issue in the history of the State. Based on its extensive deliberations, the Citizen’s Assembly recommended a health and harm-reduction led approach to addiction and drug use that would end the criminalisation of people who use drugs,” Anna Quigley stated.

“It is crucial that the Committee is re-established as soon as the new Dáil is convened so that it can complete its work and present the new Government with a comprehensive, multi-faceted and evidence-based set of proposals that will deliver on the health-led approach as set out by the Citizens’ Assembly and on the commitments now set out in the Programme for Government,” Ms Quigley concluded.