- Heatwave warning
- £1million for more borough playgrounds
- Record numbers for youth services
- New children's centre for Hampton
- New task group helps parents participate in their children’s education
- Emergency support for carers
- People needed to help disabled children take part in activities
- Greycourt School pupil designs Council’s new youth web pages
- Homecare standards at new high
- Heathrow meeting call to new transport secretary
- Council makes cycling even easier
- Making more allotments available
- Have your say on the re-development of the Avenue Centre
- Pupils aim to go waste free for lunch
- Twickenham Carnival comes to town
- Young people's votes to decide how £1million youth fund is spent
- Richmond upon Thames - the best place to live
- Lord Puttnam visits as Art Fund Prize decision day looms
- Drive easy in Richmond town centre
- Healthy alternative to drugs
- Council concerned over preservation of Normansfield
- Teaching Awards hope for Hampton Hill
- Last chance to help Orleans House Gallery win £100,000
- Be local, buy local, and be proud of Whitton
Release Date: 05/06/2009
Healthy alternative to drugs
Young people will be shown there is a healthy alternative to drugs next week, when Richmond Council outreach workers takes to the streets in a banana offensive.
The Young People’s Drug and Alcohol Support team will be spreading the word in Twickenham’s King Street and in Hanworth Road, Hampton, by handing out free bananas and information about the service, which gives honest advice and support to young people about the harm and risks of drugs and alcohol.
The aim of the banana offensive, part of national Anti-Drugs Week, is to show there is a healthy option and that honest support from experienced workers exists to help people kick the crack, smack, dope, ecstasy and other substances which can ruin lives.
As well as working with young people who feel they could be at risk, the outreach team also support families or carers concerned about their children using drugs or who are worried about how their own drug use may affect young people around them.
In addition to the the banana offensive, a group of young people who live in the borough have designed a hard hitting poster ‘cocaine lottery’ poster which lists the effects of the drug on users.
The teenagers came up with the idea and were keen to show how drugs can affect lives. As well as affecting appearances, illegal drugs such as cocaine can cause seizures, blackouts, short term memory loss and serious mood swings and can diminish sexual performance.
The poster forms part of a pack of information which is being assembled by the Council’s partners at Richmond Primary Care Trust, and which will be distributed to pubs, clubs, doctors’ surgeries and secondary schools by police Safer Neighbourhood Team officers.
Anne Lawtey, Richmond Council’s Community Planning Manager said: “We are not complacent about the issue of drugs use in Richmond upon Thames, and by involving young people in promoting the anti-drugs message, we hope to hit home and really show the ravaging affects addiction can have.”
View the full press release