Questions over 'incomprehensible' exclusion of community groups from drugs strategy steering group

The Citywide Drugs Crisis Campaign, Family Addiction Recovery Ireland (FARI) and Uisce, which represents people who use or have used drugs, have informed the Oireachtas drugs committee about their exclusion. File picture

The exclusion of community, family, peer, and traveller groups as well as local drug task forces from a department of health steering committee overseeing the development of the next national drugs strategy has been described as “incomprehensible”.

The Oireachtas drugs committee decided on Thursday to ask the minister of State for the national drugs strategy (NDS) and the minister of health to explain the reasoning behind the exclusion.