No benefits from Governmernt plans to withdraw welfare benefits

We at the Welsh Council on Alcohol and Other Drugs are opposed to the Government plans to withdraw welfare benefits from addicts who refuse treatment primarily because we have to work with the grain when dealing with people suffering from alcohol dependency syndrome and not against it. Using the stick of compulsion rarely works with these people. They might comply with the requirements in order not to loose out on benefit payments but, in truth, they are rarely motivated enough to change their addictive behaviour and little if anything is achieved in the long term apart from a great wastage of money and resources. These people need to want to change and that want seldom results from government legislation. It result when they become sick and tired of being sick and tired. That's why suffering is potentially the greatest creative force in nature. THAT's quite often what gets people to change their ways. The other possible consequence of this proposal is that those whose benefits are withdrawn might be sent back into crime in order to feed their addiction. Now that benefits no one.