Page 3410 - Week 10 - Thursday, 20 October 2022
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
the back end of the last parliamentary term. That committee recommended that the ACT government further investigate criminal justice diversion for young people that use drugs by investigating the appropriateness of a simple drug offence notice.
That was not controversial at all when it came out. The interesting thing about that, and why I have such personal interest in this, is that I was the chair of that committee. This might come as a surprise to some of the new members in this place. I was the minority member on that committee; it was a majority Liberal committee. So, I just want those watching this today to know that the Liberals are not what they claim to be today. There are members in the Canberra Liberals who do care about this issue and who do support drug law reform. It is embarrassing to me that none of them had the courage to say something.
Further, following that committee report, which was not controversial when it came out, I came into this place two months before the last ACT election. It was in the middle of the election campaign. If people look back at the sitting program for those sitting weeks, they will see that it was about the election campaign. There were stunts from the Liberals that the Labor Party was posturing for the next election. This was the election footing. So, I moved a motion calling for a simple drug offence notice to be investigated. And do you know what? It was not controversial. Mr Hanson even spoke somewhat favourably for it. He said that there would be some circumstances in which he could consider the appropriateness of a simple drug offence notice—such as MDMA at music festivals. That is not the entirety of what this proposal here before us is, but what is remarkable to me is that even Mr Hanson has moved on from the position that he held back at that time.
I was under the illusion that under the previous Leader of the Opposition, Alistair Coe, the Canberra Liberals were more conservative, but I am shocked that the views expressed in the last parliamentary term have gone to water—they have disappeared. Somewhere, somehow, the Canberra Liberals have lost their conviction to stand up for what they truly believe. Some of them do believe it. I have had conversations that I will not repeat, but I do not believe the Canberra Liberals are bad people.
I want to reiterate why this bill is such an important reform. It is a sensible, evidence-based approach to drug policy. The bill is about harm reduction and reducing ordinary people’s interaction with the criminal justice system. I do not know why the Canberra Liberals seem to think that interaction with the criminal justice system is not harmful, but it clearly is. The war on drugs is a failed policy. Across the world it has destroyed countless lives and decimated whole communities. It is based on flawed science and misinformation. It has not stopped drug use. It has not reduced drug use. Even the ACT Chief Police Officer and Deputy Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, Neil Gaughan says, “Existing criminal penalties do not discourage drug use.”
Clearly, it is time that we moved away from this punitive system that does not work. The Drugs of Dependence (Personal Use) Amendment Bill does not propose a radical change to our drug laws. It is simply an evolution of the decriminalisation model that still exists in ACT law for certain users of cannabis. Now, the simple cannabis offence notice—SCON—is a framework that we have had on the books for roughly three decades. Since the early 1990s, people found in possession of small amounts of cannabis have been eligible for an offence notice as an alternative to proceeding to
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video