Dear All

Happy new year!

Couple of bits and pieces you may be interested in.

1. BASW Special interest group in alcohol and drugs is holding its next free conference on 27 April in Birmingham.  See flyer and programme attached.  We have an excellent line up so far! The focus is on interventions for substance use through interactive workshops and an overview of the journey through substance use interventions and treatment.

2. Alcohol Concern's Embrace Project is holding its end of project conference in Manchester on 10th March.  Embrace has been working for 3 years with 9 pilot sites/alcohol agencies on improving policy and practice with domestic abuse and families.  The conference is presenting the findings, practice and evaluation of this work and shows some fascinating progress and some real challenges agencies have fought hard to overcome.  The link is:  http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/alcohol-concern-in-action/events/embracing-alcohol-domestic-abuse-and-families-a-new-approach

3. As you may be aware the Recovery Agenda is emerging within substance use services. If it does take hold it brings substance use services far closer to the traditional approaches of social work in its attention to service user led work, more holistic assessment and responses, and involvement of families and social support.  We need to hope for the best and trust that the movement towards peer led and community support is not just a quick way of cutting the substance use treatment budget!  Either way, it will hopefully bring social work and substance use fields closer together and provides a good opportunity for improving joint working for the sake of the client.  The link below will take you to  recently published report: http://www.thersa.org/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/362099/RSA-Whole-Person-Recovery-report.pdf. 

All the best

Sarah Galvani