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Drugs Map of Britain: How one reformed addict has joined the battle to help Wolverhampton's most vulnerable

Sunny Dhadley has an hour to chat before meeting up with former drug user Liam whose addiction to the legal high Black Mamba put Wolverhampton in the national spotlight last month.

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The pair are due to visit students at the Northicote campus of the new West Midlands Construction University Technical College to talk to more than 100 Year 9 and 10 pupils about the perils of addiction. Both have a very good idea what that feels like.

It is still early days on the road to recovery for 27-year-old Liam, whose struggle with Mamba was the subject of BBC3's Drugs Map of Britain, but with the help of staff and volunteers at Wolverhampton Service User Involvement Team(SUIT), the signs for him are hopeful.

Bushbury-born Sunny joined as a volunteer, was on the staff within five months and a few weeks later found himself running the place after the manager quit.

His commitment to the cause is extraordinary. Despite a 'fantastic' upbringing which saw him achieve good grades at school, he had become chronically addicted to heroin and crack cocaine.

"I liked doing non-mainstream things," he says. "I didn't know that's where it would lead but it was eight years ago, I've put it behind me now. I became very manipulative but I always had the good intention to move on with my life."

Sunny and Liam at SUIT, where addicts can find guidance for a multitude of problems.

His rehabilitation started at the age of 19 and lurched backwards and forwards for several years until he completed his final detox just eight days before his wedding day in 2007, which was also his 27th birthday.

Joining SUIT as a volunteer was a way of keeping himself on the right track while he got on with the rest of his life, Instead he found his calling.

"I wanted to move on from the idea that you just told addicts 'Stop what you're doing.' If it was that simple, there would be no addicts.

"I'm not anti-anything. Large swathes of society drink alcohol without an issue but it's important that people recognise when the lines get blurred. It's when the negative effects outweigh the positive that the situation needs to be addressed."

Along with Nacro, Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Foundation Trust and Aquarium, SUIT are contracted by Public Health Wolverhampton. They get just 2.4 per cent of the budget, equating to £130,000.

Sunny draws a distinction between what the other organisations do and what SUIT does. "We are different," he says. "We collect intelligence which is fed back to them which may lead them to look at their internal systems. They provide services for drug takers, we provide them with a voice. "

SUIT is not a treatment centre, more a one-stop shop that sits outside the main treatment system where addicts can find guidance for a multitude of problems. "It's never just a case of medical withdrawal - there are all sorts of other issues involved," he says.

On average one addict will need help - known in the trade as 'interventions' - from around four other agencies with issues such as benefits, housing and work.

Figures just published show that in the last 12 months the group has helped 953 addicts in a variety of ways, making 834 employment interventions alone on their behalf which led to 343 work placements.

Since launching in February 2007, service has grown organically to address this wider range of need. It is peer-led, meaning the three staff and eight-strong volunteering team are all recovering addicts.

"By the nature of who we are, we are able to connect with individuals and impart positivity in many areas of their lives."

The father-of-three also has an eye on the global problem. On the day we meet, he points out it us the second day of the United Nations general assembly's international drug policy convention in New York, a good opportunity for the world community to look at not just the horrific consequences of drug-taking but human rights, public health and other drivers for informing future policy.

For example, around the world 30 million people are in prison for minor drug-related offences. "The money that costs could be used in a better way for good," he says.

In February Sunny was on a five-day executive course at the Geneva Institute about global health. "It exposed me to the world issues, and it made me realise that our peer-led approach in Wolverhampton is quite different to anything else."

He has also taken part in a leadership programme in Birmingham led by American civil rights activist and politician Reverend Jesse Jackson. "He talked about learning and literacy being the key to liberation, and referred to the civil rights movement in America. It made me reflect on the work I was doing and how effective we were being."

Gathering statistics on what they do is now a yardstick to help them measure their achievements, which appear impressive.

The biggest call on their time is providing housing and welfare support, particularly so since a raft of government changes were recently brought in. In the last 12 months, they made 1,328 interventions on benefits.

In that time they have also supported 140 people back to work, made 311 health care interventions, provided Christmas diner for 135 people at a local hotel and gave out 392 food parcels.

We speak again a week after his and Liam's school talk about the dangers of drugs, which went well.

"The aim was to improve the quality of their life in some way and hopefully impact on their drug taking. I always had a home to go to and people rooting for me. It would have been much more difficult for me otherwise.

"But hopefully we gave them something to think about, I'm ever the optimist."

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