New Community Alcohol Partnership launched in Fife
A new Community Alcohol Partnership (CAP) highlighting the risks of underage drinking to children and young people has been launched in Cowdenbeath and Lochgelly today, Thursday, 31 October, 2024.
The CAP aims to work with youth services and local organisations to provide alcohol-free activities for young people. It will also work to educate young people about underage drinking and ensure that they are equipped to make the right decisions about issues such as alcohol, drugs and anti-social and criminal behaviour.
Working with local retailers, the CAP also aims to prevent underage sales and ‘proxy’ sales, where adults buy alcohol for under-18s.
The activity of the local CAP will be co-ordinated by officers based in Cowdenbeath Police Office.
Partners involved in this new initiative include: Fife Council, Scottish Fire and Rescue, Beath High and Lochgelly High School, PSYV and Fife Golf Trust.
Community Policing Sergeant John Nicol said: “Young people can face difficult challenges in their lives and we need to ensure they have the confidence to help them make the right decisions, especially since alcohol abuse can severely impact on the ability to make positive choices.
“Youths drinking can also impact on the whole community and we have listened to local concerns and I am pleased to see the community and partners coming together in this new CAP initiative to tackle these issues.
“Everyone will be working together to help young people make better choices around alcohol and reduce the harm it causes. This proactive approach to educating young people, providing alcohol-free activities and deterring underage sales, demonstrates how local organisations are working together to offer support."
Kate Winstanley, Director at CAP, said: "I am always pleased to see the launch of new partnerships. We know from research that underage drinking can lead to many social and educational problems for children and young people. We also know from our evaluations that CAPs are having a significant impact on reducing alcohol consumption amongst 13 and 16-year-olds in in the areas in which they operate.
"Local CAP schemes are established and run by people from a variety of organisations within their communities, including retailers, local authorities, police forces and schools to identify and tackle the problems associated with underage drinking. All CAPs are tailored to the needs of their local community which means that they are highly effective in getting to the root cause of the problem."
Councillor Rosemary Liewald also added: “As a preventative project in halting alcohol addiction, let’s get everyone on board.”
