The Charter in Practice
Practical guidance on applying the Charter of Rights for People Affected by Substance Use, including the FAIR approach and PANEL principles.
This part is for people who work in or run services. The Charter calls you a duty bearer. That means you have a part to play in respecting, protecting and fulfilling the rights of people affected by drugs or alcohol.
This page brings together practical guidance to help you apply the Charter in your day-to-day work. It may also be of interest to people seeking to claim their rights.
Using the Charter in your work
The Charter is a guide to taking a human rights-based approach in the decisions you make and the support you provide. It works alongside the standards and guidance you already follow, including the Medication Assisted Treatment standards.
The Charter Toolkit gives you practical guidance, checklists and examples. You can find it in the downloads below.
The UN PANEL Principles
The PANEL Principles were developed by the UN as the common understanding of a human rights-based approach. They enable human rights to be applied in everyday settings, ensuring people are treated with fairness, dignity, and respect.
People have the right to be involved in decisions that affect their rights.
Participation must be active, accessible and meaningful.
There should be monitoring of how people's rights are being affected, as well as remedies when things go wrong.
All forms of discrimination must be prohibited, prevented and eliminated.
People who face the biggest barriers to realising their rights should be prioritised.
Everyone should understand their rights, and be fully supported to take part in developing policy and practices which affect their lives.
Approaches should be grounded in the legal rights that are set out in domestic and international laws.
The FAIR approach
FAIR is a recommended way to put the Charter into practice in your day-to-day decisions. It has four steps, set out below. The Toolkit includes versions for different settings, each with a checklist to work through.
Start by seeing the whole person. Gather the facts and understand what someone needs and wants. This includes any trauma they have experienced, the support they are seeking, and practical needs such as housing and income. Ask, listen and learn.
Work out which of the Charter rights relate to what the person has told you. The right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health is often one of them. A simple way to check it is to ask whether support is available, can be reached, works for the person, and is good quality.
Identify what needs to happen and who is responsible for it. Agree a plan with the person, and their family where appropriate, so they help shape the support and understand the choices open to them.
Review how the plan is working in practice, including the person's own experience of it. Use what you learn to keep improving the support. This sits alongside the standards you already follow, such as the Medication Assisted Treatment standards.
Emerging practice examples
These examples show the Charter making a difference in real service settings, for people and for staff. Some are short films and some are downloadable case studies.
Explore more emerging practice examples and case studies
Embedding the Charter in Glasgow
Services and practitioners from Glasgow share how they're embedding the Charter in their organisations, from staff training and complaints processes to co-designing services alongside people with lived experience.
Housing reconsidered their offer
A man moving into a permanent home felt that the flat he was offered put him at risk of relapse. His advocacy worker explained his rights under the Charter. The housing team looked again, and offered him a home in an area where he felt safer.
Staff are now aware of rights too
The Charter has had a real impact on staff, not just on the people they support. Staff now recognise that everyone they work with has rights. They see it as part of their job to make those rights and choices clear, from the day someone arrives to the day they leave.
These things have to be taught word of mouth
Knowing your rights helps you stand up for yourself and support others. This information is not always easy to find, so it often spreads by word of mouth. People with their own experience have run sessions on the Charter, and were surprised how many others did not know their rights.
It just gives you a voice
Drawing on their own experience across hospital and mental health settings, one person shared simple advice. Find out everything you can about your rights, and your family's rights. Knowing your rights gives you a voice, and means you're heard.
See the person, not the drug
The Charter brings an equal voice. In the past, services decided the strategy, the gaps and what people needed. Now the people affected help shape those decisions. When their voice is at the centre, stigma falls away, because others see the person, not the drug.
Monitoring
The Charter turns abstract rights into enforceable standards, embedding accountability directly into how Scotland’s health and social care services are monitored. By integrating these principles into every inspection and audit, it ensures that people affected by substance use are met with genuine equality and respect.
Call to action
The Charter marks a shift away from a criminal justice approach by moving Scotland toward a public health approach rooted in fundamental human rights. True progress now relies on everyone, from individuals with lived experience to government policymakers, actively using these principles to design services and save lives.
Supporting families to know and use their rights
My Family My Rights is a programme run by SFAD that supports families across Scotland affected by a loved one's substance use. The programme uses the Charter to help families understand their rights, navigate complaints processes, and speak up when those rights are not met.
Peer-led Charter training across Scotland
The Scottish Drug Forum's Living Experience Engagement Groups have delivered Charter of Rights awareness training to more than 120 rights holders across 12 groups in Scotland. Peers have developed and delivered their own training sessions, and the FAIR model is used across all groups to raise local issues with commissioners and decision makers.
Changing how we respond after overdose
The West Dunbartonshire Intensive Assertive Outreach Team at Turning Point Scotland used the Charter Toolkit in reflective practice sessions to improve how they support people following a non-fatal overdose. Small changes to how quickly contact is made, how conversations are framed, and how options are offered have led to better engagement and more rights-based practice.
Additional emerging practice examples
Explore our full library of emerging practice examples and case studies, all available to download.
Training resources
Training on human rights-based approaches is available for a range of people, including service staff, volunteers, and people with lived and living experience.
The Scottish Government's Workforce Learning Directory includes a section on human rights with details of available training.
Downloads and resources
The documents below make up the Charter Toolkit. They will help you apply the Charter to real situations, including improving access to your service, responding to concerns or complaints, and challenging stigma in your team.
