Â鶹´«Ã½

We offer several resources at Â鶹´«Ã½ and in the wider community where you can get further information and support.

We provide free, confidential support to you if you're concerned about your own drug use or the drug use of other students via our Student Health and Wellbeing Service. Our support can include:

• helping you register with a
• informal pastoral support via our Listening Support Service
• ongoing counselling
• helping you access specialist external support services

Contact the

Students' Union

Alternatively, you could talk to your (NUSU) or check out the pages .

NTaR

NUSU has also partnered with Â鶹´«Ã½ Treatment and Recovery (NTaR) to offer a and get support for concerns about drug or alcohol use. All of our students can use this free, non-judgmental service. 

If you feel comfortable, you could speak to your friend about your concerns. But we know this isn't always easy to address. You can find advice on speaking directly to your friend at .

If the police carry out an investigation into illegal drugs in your accommodation, they may need to speak to all occupants. But don't worry - you won't get into trouble just because you live in that house, regardless of the course you're studying.

If you're concerned about drug use in your house, you can speak to Student Progress or the Housing Adviser in the .

Possession of drugs is a criminal offence. Each incident of possession is taken on its merits and there may be situations where it might not be appropriate to report possession to the police - for example, where wellbeing concerns outweigh other considerations.

We generally don't report cases of simple possession and other drug offences to the police, but we deal with them under our disciplinary procedures.

The police do have stop and search powers in relation to drugs per , which includes inside student accommodation. An officer needs to have reasonable grounds to suspect you possess illegal drugs in order to conduct a search under this power.

The residences team need access to your bedroom to complete termly room checks. This includes checking that your room meets our standards of cleanliness and hygiene, along with health and safety checks. We'll give you seven days' advanced notice.

We might also access your room to complete any repairs you've requested. If you're not home at the time, we'll leave a card advising that we've visited. As we're responding to your request, we'll complete the repair in line with our published repair timescales.

There are some occasions when we might require access without giving notice. This may be for a welfare check, for example, if you've been in hospital for an injury. Security colleagues or our residences team might also need access to your room in emergency situations such as fire, flood, loss of power or risk to life.

There is a zero tolerance approach to illegal drugs across NUSU licensed venues and events. If security or staff find suspected illegal drugs during a search, whilst investigating an incident, or through any other means, you may be refused entry or removed from the venue immediately. Any suspected illegal substances may be confiscated and secured in accordance with NUSU policies and procedures, and details of the incident may be shared with the police. 

Yes, this policy applies to all illicit substances, including those commonly known as ‘legal highs’.

We and NUSU encourage all our students to get involved with volunteering and shaping our policies and procedures.

Find out how to get more involved by emailing supportandadvice.union@ncl.ac.uk.

NUSU has a specialist housing adviser who can help with housing issues, including eviction. You can contact the for more support.

Our support is free and confidential. We would only ever talk to your family and tutors if there was a serious and/or life-threatening concern that could only be mitigated by contacting your parents and/or tutor.

The Students’ Union is separate from the university, so you can talk to officers, or other relevant staff members of NUSU without this information getting back to the university. The only exception to this would be if there was an immediate danger of harm to yourself or others that could only be mitigated by contacting the university.

We'll investigate all reports made to us in line with our student disciplinary procedure, whether that's at Level 1 (locally, e.g. by Accommodation Services) or Level 2 (formally by the Student Progress Service).  

We'll consider all cases on their individual merit and circumstances, and we'll only apply appropriate sanctions where we believe misconduct has occurred. 

We'll deal with repeated or serious incidents (e.g., dealing drugs) particularly seriously.

The simple answer is no. All drug use carries risk - the safest way to avoid these risks is to avoid taking drugs.

Reagent drug testing results don't mean the drug is safe to consume. You can find out