Profiles

Health and Council Chiefs pledge to reduce young people’s harmful drinking

Your Expert Witness Alcohol pledgeNorth West health and Council chiefs have pledged to reduce the harm caused by alcohol to children and young people, as new studies show alcohol continues to pose a risk to under-18s, with more than half getting drink from their parents.

A total of 16 Directors of Public Health from NHS and local government organisations across the region signed up to the North West Young People and Alcohol Programme in a ceremony in Manchester.

This week is Alcohol Awareness Week, and the pledges echo charity Alcohol Concern’s new Charter, which says all children and adolescents have the right to grow up in an environment protected from the promotion of alcohol and the negative consequences of alcohol consumption.
The directors have made promises directly to young people, pledging that they will:

• Actively seek your views, work to better understand your needs and strive to deliver the services that we know you want to see
• Ensure you have the opportunity to develop the skills, knowledge and confidence to keep yourself safe and reduce the potential harm you experience from your own and other’s drinking
• Ensure that all services do their best to protect you from alcohol related harm from your earliest years through to adulthood
• Ensure that your parents are equipped with the skills, knowledge and confidence to protect you from alcohol related harm as you grow to adulthood
• Do all we can to make sure you grow up in an environment where you are not put under pressure to drink by advertising, the availability of cheap alcohol or illegal sales.
The pledges come as a Trading Standards survey of young people’s drinking in the North West shows that the proportion of young people who binge drink more than once a week has fallen by 31% since 2007, and 29% fewer young people have bought alcohol for themselves.
But the same survey also showed an increase in the harm caused by alcohol among young people who continued to drink regularly. One in five young people reported harmful levels of drinking at more than 20 units per week – an 11% increase on 2007 – while one in six reported regretting sex after drinking, 25% more than four years ago. Of young drinkers in the North West, 55% get alcohol from their parents.
The pledges have been developed from detailed research carried out in conjunction with Lancaster University and Liverpool John Moore’s University by the North West Young People and Alcohol Programme and the North West Regional Youth Work Unit.
Ann Hoskins, interim Director of Public Health for the North West, said: “Huge strides have been made, in the North West and across the UK, to reduce the amount and frequency of young people’s alcohol use, but we know that many children and young people continue to be placed at risk of serious physical and emotional harm as a result of their own, or others’, use of alcohol.
“The pledges have real, tangible actions behind them: all the Directors of Public Health who have signed up have promised to carry out 15 separate projects, including banning alcohol advertising on all council-controlled billboards within a mile of any school, and developing new strategies for intervention from birth to adulthood where alcohol use is putting a young person at risk.
“They will also place new emphasis on engagement with parents, to ensure families understand the impact of their own alcohol use, and can access all the latest information to help them prevent alcohol harm in their own children. All the pledges have been developed from what young people themselves say about the pressures and circumstances which result in their excessive drinking.
Arif Rajpura, Director of Public Health for NHS Blackpool, said: “The successes of policies such as tightened procedures for checking proof of age before selling alcohol and improved education have contributed to large reductions in the number of young people who are drinking, but we cannot be complacent while those who continue to drink are consuming alcohol at harmful levels.
“By signing up to these pledges, health and social care organisations throughout the North West have shown that they are fully committed to working with young people and their families to build positive relationships and reduce the damage caused by drinking.
Lorraine Butcher, Strategic Director for Children, Families & Adults for Cheshire East Council and the health spokesperson for the North West Directors of Children’s Services Group, said: “Alcohol can cause significant and long-term harm to children and young people.
“As leaders of children’s services we welcome opportunities like the pledges to both reiterate our concern about this issue and show what we aim to do to protect children and young people. Although there are some positive signs that underage drinking may be falling, those that do drink do so in larger quantities, putting them at risk. We want to work with those young people, their families and local services, to help them avoid taking risks that can have a profound effect on them as they grow up.”