Funding for Drugs charities is under threat and will get more challenging in the next few years, the chief executive of the Bridge project in Bradford has warned.

Jon Royle said changes to cash allocations by the Government means that previously-protected funds will be put into the same pot of cash for all public health services and could mean less cash for charities such as Bridge.

Bridge is the largest charity helping those addicted to drugs in Bradford and yesterday it opened its new £850,000 community-based abstinence centre.

The opening of the Unity Recovery Centre in Manningham Lane comes at a time when numbers of people attending Bridge for ketamine use are up 30 per cent and a warning comes about so-called party drugs after two people collapsed outside a nightclub at the weekend after taking an unknown substance.

Delivering his speech to dignitaries, including the Lord Mayor of Bradford, Councillor Naveeda Ikram, Mr Royle said: “The days when we could rely on the Government 100 per cent to fund our sector will be a thing of the past.

“No longer will funding for drugs services be ring-fenced, but it will be one of just many areas of responsibility for public health and will need to compete against priorities such as obesity, smoking cessation, sexual health and cancer prevention services.

“Here are the facts: in Bradford there are more than 4,500 people using the most dangerous drugs heroin or crack.

“Just one heroin and crack user I spoke to told me that for ten years he was committing two burglaries a week to fund his drug habit.

“His mother had a nervous breakdown and was hospitalised and he lost his children who are now in the care system. As if that was not bad enough, he recently heard that his oldest child is starting to get into trouble with the law through truancy and drug use.

“Just look at the carnage there, the costs to society in terms of crime, the impact on the police, social care and hospital costs and the transmission of these behaviours into the next generation.”

The charity expects to help 250 people addicted to drugs each year with the new centre, with 120 people coming through the doors at any one time.

They will have treatment depending on the stage of their recovery, with therapies, counselling sessions and a room for people to learn basic computer skills and English and Maths.

Drugs tests will be carried out on those attending with restrictions to services for those positive and eventual referral elsewhere if they are found to be under the influence three times.