Rowdy Yates on Lifeline’s origins
The drugs field has been challenged to evidence its value during 2007/08. Media interest in outcomes, and adversarial internal debates on abstinence and recovery have opened up new perspectives (and new audiences) for our work. This has taken place in a context of public sector reform. At Lifeline we are undergoing radical change too, and we are building on our past to set foundations for the future.
The value of looking back is not always clear. However looking back without sentiment at times of change can help clarify what are our critical foundations. For independent organsiations, it is important to review our fundamental direction of travel against our constitution and be clear about what we do.
We were very grateful that Rowdy Yates, Lifeline’s first Chief Executive, allowed us to film him for our Film Exchange on Alcohol and Drugs. Some of us were reminded and others learned for the first time that Lifeline’s foundations were built on:
- Criminal Justice Partnerships
- Open Access Day Services
- Service User Led Peer Intervention
- Therapeutic Community Roots
- Early Community Drug Team Collaboration
- Professional Drug Training Contract
The commitment and insights of Rowdy and his colleagues prepared Lifeline for the radical developments that emerged in the 1980’s. Public Health responses to the growth of heroin use in localities opened up new avenues for working with substance use problems.
Michael Linnell describes how Lifeline was one of the organisations able to support those at greatest risk of harm during the 1980s and 90s. One major vehicle was the publication of direct, honest and accessible information. Lifeline learned how to communicate with, and work alongside drug users in a range of settings to produce its information. This work has evolved as an integral part of the UK’s Harm Reduction story.
Last year Lifeline Publications produced award winning ‘Out of Your Head’ guides on mental illness and drug use and a Subutex booklet for the Prison Service.
See www.lifelinepublications.org
The first ten year drug strategy ‘Tackling Drugs Together’ followed in the mid 1990s and a second strategy, ‘Drugs: Protecting Families and Communities’ has now been published. Lifeline and colleagues across the sector benefited from growth: growth in service development, event, pilot, research and publication funding. This delivered us the treatment field we have today.
As we move into a new public service framework we aim to continue to evolve and develop but this will be with less resource. We must respond to the external forces that affect organisation of course, but we must do that in order to shape interventions for those people directly affected by problematic drug use.
The diversity of our history, our energy for the future, and our openness to change and improvement will help us do that.
See ‘Fitting into the Future’ by Ian Wardle
