In our latest blog, Tom Bennett, Rights in Recovery Development Officer at the Scottish Recovery Consortium (SRC), discusses the importance of overcoming stigma to understand the human rights of people with alcohol problems when accessing support. SRC’s recent publication ‘Using Human Rights in Recovery – A Guide‘ invites all those impacted by addiction to become better informed about their human rights so they can advocate for themselves and others.
Whichever you choose to describe the problem/condition/illness/disease of addiction/ alcohol dependence/ problematic or harmful alcohol use (however hopefully no longer abuse), it’s a demonstrably treatable health condition from which we can recover. That alcohol deaths have risen to their highest level in 14 years, and Scotland continues to have the most unenviable record of alcohol harm in the UK, we can conclude not everyone is accessing and receiving a good level of healthcare. The 40% decline in the number of people commencing specialist alcohol treatment from 2013/14 to 2021/22 certainly won’t have helped. (Alcohol Focus Scotland https://www.alcohol-focus-scotland.org.uk/news/news/decline-in-alcohol-treatment-in-scotland/ )
We know from the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland ‘Ending the Exclusion’ report from 2022 that ‘People with lived experience and families/carers describe a system in which they feel discriminated and are often ‘bounced’ between mental health services and addictions services.’ (p.8) It’s fair to say that won’t have helped either.
Alcohol health harms are experienced proportionally much more by those in the most deprived areas than the least. Money is a protective factor, and we know that those in the most socioeconomically deprived areas are more likely to experience the greatest barriers to having their human rights realised.
Human rights are the most basic standards we require to live a healthy life in safety, with freedom and dignity. Scottish Government introduced its Rights, Respect and Recovery (RRR) strategy in 2018, and this strategy set out the government’s ambition to reduce alcohol and drugs related harms through the implementation of a human rights-based approach (HRBA). Many of us were pretty excited about this progressive approach and felt optimistic about how a properly implemented HRBA would empower people to access and play a role in effective compassionate support that would facilitate a recovery journey. Six years later, progress has been slow, but we are still optimistic and excited about its potential. The successful implementation of an HRBA will be transformative. That said, the success of an HRBA hinges on sufficient awareness and understanding of human rights and the HRBA across the sector and people accessing support.
SRC has been working with Lived Experience Recovery Organisations (LEROs) since 2019 to increase their individual and collective understanding of human rights and an HRBA. We deliver introductory sessions where we basically tell participants that despite what they may think, they actually have human rights. We deliver full day workshops that covers the HRA 1998, people with an alcohol problem’s stigmatising exclusion from the protection of the Equality Act (2010), PANEL principles and much more. We also offer, in partnership with the British Institute of Human Rights (BIHR), our Rights in Recovery Leadership Programme – a 30-hour course that looks in more detail at parts of Human Rights Act 1998 and other relevant pieces of human rights and equalities law and developments.
Feedback from course participants highlighted the need for a concise, easy to read, guide that took the most pertinent aspects of human rights for people in recovery and brought them together in one place. Therefore, again in partnership with colleagues at BIHR we produced our Using Human Rights in Recovery – A Guide (downloadable here https://scottishrecoveryconsortium.org/resources )
We hope this Guide can help people with an alcohol problem in Scotland to become empowered to know and claim their human rights. We hope that people gain the confidence to use human rights language when accessing support and come to see that, when used appropriately and effectively, these strategies can level the playing field and can, when necessary, be used as levers to hold duty-bearers to account. We hope that family members of people affected by their alcohol use can also use this document to better understand their rights.
Within the Guide we have case studies, courageously contributed by members of Scotland’s LEROs, who have had experiences where services have failed to respect, protect and fulfil their human rights. Individuals in custody refused medical attention until an informed advocate speaks up on their behalf. Individuals who have had access to recovery support seemingly withheld for asking for appropriate medical treatment, in places of detention. An informed and empowered constituency of people in recovery will ask to be treated with dignity and respect, and those on the other side of the table will have to make overdue changes to the structures and standards of service that they offer.
People in recovery continually tell us of the barriers they faced when accessing medical services, and how they felt unable to participate meaningfully in decisions which affected them, and they felt powerless to challenge decisions. The information in our Guide can help to redress this imbalance of power.
The same goes for people involved with the justice system. Too often we hear tragic stories of people receiving, poor, even negligent levels of care in places of detention. Conditions that no one would describe as being conducive to recovery. It’s time to look again at where responsibility lies for today’s crisis. For too long now the blame has been laid at the feet of those who need support.
So, Scottish Recovery Consortium’s call to action is to be a part of the solution, learn about human rights, learn how to be an active rights-holder, learn how to be a responsible duty-bearer. Get in touch if you would like to know more.
It’s a human condition, which requires humane treatment.
SHAAP Blogposts are published with the permission of the authors. The views expressed are solely the authors’ own and do not necessarily represent the views of Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP).