(2) how many residential drug treatment places his Department plans to fund in (a) 2010 and (b) 2011.
The Department does not directly fund any residential rehabilitation. Decisions on how many residential drug treatment places to fund are made by local commissioning partnerships based on assessed local need and individually assessed client need. This information is not available centrally.
However, the national drug treatment monitoring system (NDTMS), managed by the National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse (NTA), does collect data on the number of individuals receiving residential treatment. Latest figures show that in 2007-08, 4,306 adults were recorded in residential rehabilitation and 6,742 adults received in-patient services in hospital.
It is important to note that there is known under-reporting of referral data to the NDTMS, and so any figures regarding this sector are likely to be an under estimate of activity. As such, the data the NTA collects through the NDTMS is not a complete or accurate picture.
Waiting times data for residential drug treatment places has been supplied previously and I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave him on 5 March 2009, Official Report, column 1765W.