Pubdate: Wed, 20 Jun 2001
Source: Guardian, The (UK)
Copyright: 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited
Contact:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardian/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/175
Author: Dave Brindle

BELIEF IN THE BATTLE

Paul Hayes, Head Of The National Treatment Agency

When Paul Hayes was a probation officer in the east end of London, in the 
late 1970s, he had just "a handful" of drug misusers on his caseload. 
Things have since changed so dramatically that drugs are now a key issue 
for the criminal justice system not only in east London, but in most of the 
country. And Hayes is about to take a leading role in the battle against them.

 From the middle of next month, Hayes will be chief executive of the new 
national treatment agency (NTA), set up by the government to raise the 
standards, and ensure the consistency, of treatment of substance misuse. He 
makes his first public appearance tomorrow at a conference, supported by 
the Guardian, which is to examine prospects for the agency's success.

Even though Hayes is not yet in post, he is anxious to take the opportunity 
to stamp his mark on the debate and allay some of the concerns about the 
NTA that are only too apparent in the sector. Above all, he is keen to 
assure treatment agencies that he is not about to name and shame those 
perceived to be doing a less-than-good job.

"We've got 400 agencies, ranging from very sophisticated teaching hospitals 
to local community groups that have grown up and acquired a treatment 
element," says Hayes. "Some are giving drug misusers high-quality 
treatment; some are giving them mediocre treatment; and some are giving 
them treatment that isn't satisfactory at all. But I don't want to start 
rubbishing the staff who are delivering the services.

"One of the mistakes that I think has been made in efforts to improve 
public services in the past is that the hard work of staff on the ground 
has been made to seem less worthwhile. The NTA intends to avoid that."

Hayes, a 50-year-old Liverpudlian, has been in probation work since 1974 - 
"the only proper job I ever had" - and was, until recently, chief probation 
officer for south-east London. After that initial period in the east end, 
he was working inIslington, north London, in the 1980s, when drug misuse 
started to emerge among probation clients on a large scale. In 1988, he 
wound up in charge of an inner-London demonstration unit, testing new ways 
of dealing with clients, and led the development of techniques of working 
with those who continue to misuse drugs - techniques eventually endorsed by 
government.

His expertise won Hayes a place on the advisory committee on the misuse of 
drugs, set up in 1991, and he has led on drugs policy for the Association 
of Chief Officers of Probation since 1992.

At the NTA, Hayes will be responsible for treatment funds rising to more 
than UKP 200m a year by 2003. But he stresses he has no intention of taking 
the commissioning of services away from local drug action teams, other than 
perhaps in exceptional cases of highly specialist services or - "and I hope 
not" - as a last resort when a team has demonstrably and persistently failed.

The way he intends to achieve consistency of service, ratcheting up the 
quality of provision where it is low, is through advice and performance 
management. This will mean dissemination of research into what works - and 
achieving a shift, as he puts it, from the sector's traditional reliance on 
belief systems to an approach based on hard evidence. He is braced for the 
groans. "People will understandably think: 'More bureaucracy; more form 
filling'," he says. "But if we are going to account for more than UKP 200m 
of public money, we have got to show that it works."

In this context, Hayes sees his first priority as propagating a human 
resources strategy for the sector. He thinks treatment agencies have to get 
better, quickly, at nurturing and retaining good staff as well as competing 
in increasingly competitive labour markets for fresh talent. Some work on 
this is already done, he says, and proposals will be taken to the NTA board 
"at a very early stage".

There is also likely to be an early indication of Hayes's determination 
that the NTA should have some regional structure. "In the drugs field, 
particularly, there has been a history of policy being made to fit London's 
needs - and sometimes Liverpool's and Manchester's needs," he says. "The 
NTA will be as relevant to Carlisle and St Austell as to Hackney and Brixton.

There has already been a consultation exercise within the sector on how the 
new agency should set about its task, while at the same time accommodating 
a sharply rising workload. Under government targets, the number of problem 
drug misusers in treatment programmes is sup posed to increase 66% by 2005 
and 100% by 2008.

Hayes describes the consultation responses as very supportive. He also says 
he is "very keen" to see the NTA extend its work into alcohol misuse, as 
most responses suggested. However, he is clear that this would need 
additional funding. "I'm not sure it would be right to expect alcohol 
treatment to be funded from spending review money that was specifically set 
down for drugs," he says.

Undoubtedly one of the big problems of the treatment sector is rapid 
turnover of staff. Hayes thinks that this means people tend to lack a long 
view. While he accepts that the challenge facing the NTA is considerable, 
he insists that much spadework has been done.

He says: "On the drug action team where I am a member, in Croydon, there is 
the chief executive of the local authority, the chief executive of the 
health authority, the local police commander and the local chief probation 
officer all sitting round a table with other senior officials, monitoring 
the progress of drugs policy in Croydon and making a real difference to 
what happens. If you look back at the way we worked even in the late 1980s, 
you would have thought that was heaven. Things are a lot better than they 
were."

Tomorrow's conference, in London, is organised by Pavilion Publishing in 
association with the Guardian and charity Turning Point. Details from 
Pavilion on 01273-623222.
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MAP posted-by: Beth