Sundeep Dhadley: Wolverhampton's man on a mission

The issue of drugs in some communities is seen as a taboo and this is definitely so of the Asian community. Whilst statistics reveal a sharp increase of drug usage within the Asian community, Sundeep Dhadley is one man who is proud to help vulnerable recovering drug addicts, to ensure they get a second chance.

Dhadley is a participant on OBV’s West Midland Civic Leadership Programme and is emerging as an inspiring future leader. He works with recovering addicts for SUIT a charity based organisation helping individuals with drug misuse.

He also has a position as a Third Sector Representative on the Police and Crime Board in Wolverhampton, representing the BME community, which he believes is crucial. As part of his role he represents vulnerable recovering drug addicts, who due to their former drug addiction are sometimes perceived as criminals by the community and the police.

For Dhadley, this role allows him to have a direct input in policing in Wolverhampton and helps him to achieve his aim of ‘making the system fairer and better, whilst still keeping public safety as a priority’. Recently Dhadley has become involved in an All Party Parliamentary Group on Drug Misuse, which enables him to share his experience of working with recovering addicts whilst driving future policy at a national level.

Another one of Dhadley’s aims is to break down the myths of drug addicts especially in parts of the BME community. He has been supporting academic research into and around social injustice, and how certain groups are affected by substance misuse. For him certain cultures in the BME community feel ashamed of the use of drugs, and tend to brush the issue under the carpet, which he believes needs to be tackled. There are a large amount of public services out there to help individuals with these problems, but these services are being underused due to people being ashamed to ask for help. He believes many groups are being marginalised by communities due to cultural reasons, and individuals need to ask for help when they need it.

He said,

Everyone deserves a second chance. In a fair and democratic society, everyone should have access to all opportunities which shouldn’t be tainted just because of a previous addiction.”

Dhadley is actively working with the British Asian community on creating a short video about substance misuse and domestic violence. In the video, recovering addicts from the Asian community are interviewed to ensure issues like these are heard and dealt with. He also hopes to go to the Punjab region in India to tackle injustice equality and focus on drug addictions as he recognises that there is a great need, but the infrastructure and support for recovery addicts is not strong.

In addition to all this, Dhadley has also been rubbing shoulders with MEPs and Councillors. He has been working with Councillor Roger Lawrence, Leader of Wolverhampton City Council, which has helped him see how councils make decisions, in tough economic times. He has been able to get an insight on how the system and the process works, as well as share his work and knowledge of the third sector with Councillor Lawrence. Whilst working with Councillor Lawrence, he also supported MEP candidate Neena Gill in her campaign, learning about about European politics and the role of the EU.

Dhadley is keen to learn more about the political system and has recently started working with the parliamentary outreach programme, and aims to take on the formal training to allow him to learn more about parliamentary bills, and how they are processed. As well as him taking part in the programme, he also wants to support the groups of recovering drug addicts to get involved, giving them the opportunity to see how the country works.

Dhadley has made remarkable achievements, and believes that the Civic Leadership programme has contributed to this, as it has enabled him to gain access to closed doors, or doors that he wasn’t aware of. Here at OBV we feel privileged to have had such a successful candidate, and with Dhadley’s future plans of aspiring to become an MEP, we expect to hear many more great things from him in the near future.

Roshni Vekereya