Recent progress in tackling drug-use will be eroded unless the Government returns the issue to the top of the political agenda, community groups claimed yesterday during a protest march through Dublin city.
About 500 people from anti-drugs campaigns marched to Government Buildings to highlight the need for improved treatment services for drug-users.
Mr Fergus McCabe, a member of the National Drugs Strategy Team, said it was sad that, after the progress of the past five to six years, "the foot has gone off the pedal and the eye has gone off the ball" in recent months.
He urged the Government and the Minister with responsibility for the area, Mr Noel Ahern, to implement the 100 recommendations of the National Drugs Strategy urgently.
One of its recommendations was to reduce the waiting time for treatment to one month, said Ms Susan Collins, co-chairwoman of City Wide Campaign, which organised yesterday's event. However, she said, "there are still people waiting for up to a year for treatment".
She added: "There's a need to provide proper resources, not just for methadone but for aftercare and other services. Also, we need clinics to stay open after 5 p.m. and on Saturdays and Sundays."
Yesterday's demonstration was the first to be organised by the campaign since 1996. While much had been achieved in that time, Ms Collins said, in a reference to Fianna Fáil's pre-election slogan, "there is definitely a lot more to do".
She welcomed a commitment in the Dáil yesterday by the Tánaiste, Ms Harney, to "ringfence" funding to anti-drugs groups under the Community Employment (CE) scheme, which is being scaled back due to falling unemployment.
However, Ms Collins said: "We will be keeping a close eye on things to ensure there are no ill-effects from the cutbacks."
Earlier yesterday, Ms Harney said all "mainline" drugs task force projects "will be, and are, ringfenced". There could not be a drugs officer for every CE scheme, but "any drugs-related workers approved through the drugs task force initiative are ringfenced".
She was responding to Labour's deputy leader, Mr Brendan Howlin, who demanded a "specific commitment" that all schemes supporting disadvantaged areas in general and drugs projects in particular would not be affected by the CE cutbacks.
The Government was reducing the ceiling of places under the scheme to 25,000, which, said Mr Howlin, was "3,000 lower than the guaranteed floor under the last partnership programme".
Some Independent TDs attended yesterday's protest, along with deputies from Labour, Sinn Féin, Fine Gael and the Socialist Party.