Drug Death Taskforce funding allocation: FOI release

Information requested

The Scottish Government website stated on 5th September 2019 that £20 million would be allocated to the Drug Death Taskforce. The 2022 Drug Death Taskforce website provides details of spending £9 million since the formation of the DDTF. Could you provide details of the financial allocation of remaining £11 million?

Response

The Scottish Government’s Programme for Scotland 2019-20 announced further action to tackle the issues associated with use of illicit drugs and stop the rising number of drug deaths including an additional £20 million of funding available over two years allocated over 4 priority areas:

• providing funding to allow our new Drug Deaths Taskforce to support innovative projects, test new approaches and drive forward specific work to improve the quality of services.
• establishing joint working protocols between alcohol and drug services and mental health services to improve access, assessment and outcomes from January 2020.
• developing a national pathway for Opiate Substitute Therapy to make sure that it is effective across the country and help to reduce stigma.
• establishing an Inclusive Scotland Fund to support a number of local areas to involve people with lived experience of severe, multiple disadvantage in developing whole system approaches to improve outcomes.

This commitment meant that the Drug Deaths Taskforce had an allocation of £9 million to invest in 2020/21 and £5 million in 2021/22. A breakdown is available on the Drug Deaths Taskforce website funding page and is summarised in the following table:

2020-2021: Alcohol and Drug Partnership Fund	£3,000,961
2021-2022: Alcohol and Drug Partnership Fund	£3,000,961
Research Programme Fund	£780,974
Innovation and National Development Fund	£7,496,725
Other funding	£570,000
Total	£14,849,621

While this has exceeded the £14 million allocation, the Drug Deaths Taskforce has committed beyond its agreed end date and Scottish Government have supported its work with additional resource to assist in developing the evidence based strategy to tackle drug related deaths and harms in Scotland.

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