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Alcohol/Drugs/Gambling
Young people increasingly drink in moderation

It is perhaps because of this very broad conclusion which can be characterised as “good parenting leads to emotionally healthy children who tend to make sensible life decisions” that Demos’ ten recommendations are, to my mind, rather woolly and not particularly likely to be implemented by government – and even less so in this age of austerity.

Alcohol/Drugs/Gambling
What illegal drugs does Europe produce?

It seems likely that the relative ‘drought’ of ecstasy on European markets in 2008–2009 was caused by successful international cooperation and law enforcement efforts in both Europe and Asia that targeted the suppliers of the main ecstasy precursor, PMK.

On Probation
Transforming Rehabilitation in Limbo

It will be interesting to see whether the picture of reducing reoffending services looks any different by the time of the next report. At the moment, the voluntary sector which works with offenders and their families are stuck in the same position as Dante’s virtuous pagans, not sure if the future will be heaven or hell.

Criminal Justice
Preventing the unnecessary criminalisation of women

Far too many women are brought into the justice system unnecessarily. Thousands of women are inappropriately criminalised every year to the detriment of individuals, families and communities. For many women it is their repeated victimisation which has led to involvement in the justice system

Policing
Our police service keeps shrinking

Latest official police workforce stats. Given our current fixation on reducing the budget deficit, it’s hard to imagine that next year’s workforce figures will show anything other than a further decrease.

Alcohol/Drugs/Gambling
The legal supply of cannabis

This is the seventh in a weekly blog series based on the findings of the 2015  annual European Drugs Report published by

Prison
Major concerns about conditions for children in custody

The Chief Inspector again attributed some of the difficulties to cuts in staff numbers. Given the reduction in the number of children in custody, it should be an achievable goal for new Justice Secretary Michael Gove to turn the situation around.

Payment by Results
What did we learn from the Doncaster prison PbR reoffending pilot?

Sodexo and NACRO are the new partnership running the South Yorkshire Community Rehabilitation Company and it will be interesting to see whether they can have a positive impact on reducing the reoffending of released prisoners – their results will also be subject to a payment by results contracting approach, this time using both a binary and frequency (but not severity of offence) payment model.

Alcohol/Drugs/Gambling
The increased popularity of image enhancing drugs

The most worrying aspect of SIED use, alongside its increased popularity, is that very few users engage with drug treatment agencies or other health services, with the exception of using needle and syringe exchange programmes.

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