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This study aims to describe and analyse an approach in the city of Bremen (Germany) to establish streetwork-supported tolerance zones for local open drug and alcohol scenes to reduce related disorder and nuisance in public spaces.

The qualitative methodology included systematic participant observations at public sites of drug and alcohol use, and problem-centred interviews with different groups of respondents (residents, passers-by, trades people, drug users, experts from addiction help and police).

In residential districts, tolerance zones were well accepted by their target group and found to reduce perceived disorder and nuisance in public space. However, their success depends on the social and spatial conditions of the chosen location, its surrounding urban infrastructure, cooperation among local actors and characteristics of drug using groups.

Usually, policing of open drug scenes focuses on repression and law enforcement. The example of Bremen suggests that streetwork-supported tolerance zones dedicated to the drug scene can substantially reduce disorder and nuisance in public space.

This article describes a system for measuring performance in Edinburgh, developed across all services working with people sleeping rough. This performance framework is based on outcomes rather than processes. A single monitoring system has been developed that is used by a wide range of services. Monitoring is built around a matrix of change, mapping changes in the life circumstances of people using services. Data can be collated from all services and translated into strategic performance. Although this approach presents major challenges for all partners, it offers a major improvement in how services are monitored.

The 3,4-methylenedioxymetamphetamine (MDMA) content in ecstasy tablets has increased enormously throughout Europe across the past decade. This study aims to determine whether this is caused by the production of “stronger” tablets (more mg MDMA per mg of tablet), or if tablets have simply been getting larger and heavier (more mg of tablet in total).

A data set of 31,716 ecstasy tablets obtained in 2012–2021 by 10 members of the Trans European Drug Information (TEDI) network was analysed.

The MDMA mass fraction in ecstasy tablets has remained virtually unchanged over the past 10 years, with increased MDMA contents being attributed almost exclusively to increased tablet weight. These trends seem to be uniform across Europe, despite varying sampling and analytical techniques being used by the TEDI participants. The study also shows that while tablet weight correlates perfectly with MDMA content on a yearly basis, wide variations in the MDMA mass fraction make such relations irrelevant for determining the MDMA content of individual tablets.

These results provide new opportunities for harm reduction, given that size is a tangible and apparently accurate characteristic to emphasise that one tablet does not simply equate to one dose. This is particularly useful for harm reduction services without the resources for in-house quantification of large numbers of ecstasy tablets, although the results of this study also show that chemical analysis remains crucial for accurate personalised harm reduction.

The findings are both new and pertinent, providing a novel insight into the market dynamics of ecstasy tablet production at a transnational level.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the multi-agency approach adopted in Liberton/Gilmerton, Edinburgh in Scotland to positively involve young people in shaping local service provision and to tackle rising anti-social behaviour. The approach and methodology of the engagement process used is described in detail in order to enable other authorities and services to learn from established practice.

The approach was developed over two years and saw the expression of over 1,500 young people’s views, which influenced 40 local statutory and voluntary services to deliver on over 70 pledges locally to improve service provision in direct response to expressed need.

The paper summarises the positive outcomes delivered as a result of the work which has transformed the way that partners plan, design and deliver their services locally, and has resulted in many significant outcomes including a 17 per cent drop in youth crime, young people opening their own Youth Cafe, and launching their annual YouthTalk Awards Event. The initiative has been held up by the HMIe as a model of best practice, and is being replicated across the city through other library locations as a successful way to engage young people in improving the quality of life in their communities.

The paper includes implications for the development of library and other services to work in an integrated way to positively engage with young people in order for them to be included in decision-making processes.

This paper contributes to the studies on best practice in working positively with young people.

The recently published Home Office strategy document, A co‐ordinated prostitution strategy and a summary of responses to Paying the price (Home Office, 2006), focuses on the role of men in prostitution. However, this focus is centred on men being the abusers of women and children involved in the sex industry, and vilifies men as the perpetrators that drive the sex market. This article traces the implications of the strategy for men involved in prostitution.

The rise in regulatory requirements for health and safety skills certification over the past two decades prompted a tick box approach to training, with organisations simply undertaking the minimum requirements in order to maintain compliance. But the planned reduction in health and safety red tape combined with growing industry demand for proven skills from contractors and suppliers, as well as the cross skilling that has become so important during the on going economic downturn, is changing attitudes. The purpose of this paper is to explore this.

The paper includes a viewpoint and a case study.

Having learnt the value of up‐skilling staff in recent years to cope with a recessionary economy, organisations are now actively embracing the value of both company specific and industry standard training to build skills and demonstrate to customers a commitment to quality.

Ensuring employees have the right skills goes far beyond meeting regulatory obligations. As this article explains, there is a real opportunity to build strong, long term employee competency, minimise accidents and create the skills base that reflects the business needs of the organisation.

Sandvik export huge helical coils to Middle East. Three huge stainless steel coils, each measuring 4,000mm in diameter, were recently shipped to the Middle East for installation inside a reactor to be used for phosphate production.

Notes that the most important fixed asset of any water distribution company is its pipe network. However, once installed it is difficult to manage not only because it is buried in the ground but because management of potable water networks encompasses complex activities concerned with supply. In addition, privatized UK water utilities are required to balance often conflicting demands from their shareholders, regulators and customers. Maintenance, including rehabilitation, replacement, and/or expansion of existing networks to meet current and future demands, is the major element of potable water distribution management. Introduces hydroinformatics as a way forward for water network management and maintenance in particular. Looks at elements such as geographic information systems and artificial neural networks. Outlines the scope for improvement to the new technologies for maintenance of water networks together with a wide range of possible applications.

Nondominant youth faces complex structural inequalities and injustices that have a direct impact on their academic learning outcomes and psychosocial well-being. Research suggests that supporting the development of students’ critical consciousness not only improves their educational and career trajectories but also provides students with the tools, language and skills they need to examine, act upon and heal from the sociopolitical realities and injustices they face in their daily lives.

This paper reports findings from a two-year Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) study conducted with students in a police-oriented Career and Technical Education program. YPAR was used as pedagogy for nondominant students to explore how to leverage their funds of knowledge (FK) in their learning and future careers as police officers to improve community–police relations.

This paper reports on one aspect of the findings from the YPAR project that includes: a) the relationship between students’ difficult FK, critical consciousness development and career aspirations; b) how, if left unaddressed, students’ difficult FK could mediate deficit and internally oppressive views of Communities of Color and other nondominant groups; and c) the power of transforming students’ difficult FK into pedagogical assets.

Engaging students’ difficult FK can support critical consciousness development and facilitate students’ ability to navigate and resist oppressive spaces, sustain their well-being and empower themselves and their families and communities.

This paper introduces hydroinformatics, a discipline that has strong ancestry in the computational sciences and artificial intelligence, as a way forward for water network management and maintenance in particular. Within hydroinformatics, geographic information systems and data mining (artificial neural networks and genetic algorithms specifically) are the new technologies with probably the widest applicability to the water industry. This paper introduces basic concepts of hydroinformatics and data mining, explains the process by which they may be applied and describes basic technologies with their advantages and disadvantages.