The health centre itself is not at risk! It's the children who ( remote) are more potentially now than if the servive were elsewhere, in that their parents were not aware of this particular element of risk in order to inform their decision as to where their child would study. The issue is with the provision of drug related services on a school site.

It would be stupid to think the support services should be shut down and made unavailable altogether as its obvious such services can deliver tremendous value to Surbiton and the wider Kingston community. Despite the fact that some (not mentioned in the risk assessment) patients may come from other boroughs and in addition might be legally bound to attend the programme as part of a court order which may or may not be part of a wider crime related offense. This is another issue that has compounded parents concerns and in my opinion changes the paradigm to warrant justified concern.

I also found certain conclusions within the risk assessment 'wording' to be a little patronising and dismissive of parents on some key issues across the entire document. For example, the part about the risk of methadone consumption on site as some patients might want an immediate fix on leaving (a high probability in my opinion), was dismissed outright on the grounds that methadone/drugs were not provided, only ''prescriptions were'', to the patients of the wellness service. It then goes onto briefly contradict or clarify (you decide) and confirm that methadone is available through the pharmacy (ignoring the fact that it is on the same site) but as a preventative measure CCTV and other controls were in place to record or prevent any direct physical ( not verbal or visual) interaction with children, should the risk arise.

The assessment of this risk then concludes with....

"This is not a risk that is associated with the Wellbeing Service as they do not administer any drugs. This could be a risk for any public space in any urban location; also methadone is administrated at a number of pharmacies in the area.

"For this reason we have rated this as not relevant."

....See what I mean?

The key issue for parents has always has been its location, secifically it's proximity to the school and not the provision of the service itself... I imagine this risk assessment will only piss more parents off given the tone and bias.

I wasn't impressed with the risk rating system either. ....An incident of physical attack or threat of physical attack are graded as a closure and major event respectively, understandable yes. However, a moderate rating is given if a child is directly verbally threatened by an attendee of the wellness service although not physically harmed, with another possible risk being noted as an out of court settlement.

I really had to dig deep to oppose the location of the programme but it was the most logical thing to do given ...well 'logic'! in 'this situation'. I stress 'this situation' as it's easy to say.. 'well drugs can be consumed anywhere and the potential risk is therefore everywhere' as the assessment does in several places, conveniently forgetting we are talking about a specific place where there is a school and drug abuse support services providing prescriptions for drugs availability on the same site, still within a stones throw of the playground on the same built up site .

I think a threat to their child is something every parent at the school thought about when they found out about this. At the same time the value of the wellness service to our community is without question and I think many of the parents will agree with this.

The risk assessment will probably do more damage and go further to create distance between both sides and in the end Surbiton will potentially lose a valuable service.

I think the risk of any incidence reduces when you remove the key drivers to the problem. In this case could there be a potential solution to keeping the counselling and prescription services on site but removing the supply of replacement drugs and substances through the attached pharmacy from the site. As discussed, there are two pharmacies just outside the site premises ( who, I'm told, have had a direct financial impact as a result of opening the additional pharmacy on the new school/hospital site.).

This would require compromise involving everyone but would drastically reduce the possibility of an incident and allow us to keep a valuable service running.... It might even help the other two pharmacies survive :)

As for parents taking photos of potential threats in order to develop a case, although I don't condone the activity, you'd be surprised at the level of paranoia and care that we suffer when it comes to our kids .unfortunately it's not curable!

wow!
So the selfish parents of children want to close down a health clinic because they are afraid of drug addicts!?
I’m sick and tired of parents and their precious offspring!
How about you teach your kids to be vigilant smart considerate clean and polite! Rather than noisy loud brash littering everywhere?
You are not setting an example in being compassionate!
No surprise that the young generation is selfish and inconsiderate given selfish parents like this lot!