Page 2921 - Week 10 - Thursday, 15 August 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
ADJOURNMENT
MR SPEAKER: Order! It being 4.30 pm, I propose the question:
That the Assembly do now adjourn.
Mr Berry: I require the question to be put forthwith without debate.
Question resolved in the negative.
HIV, ILLEGAL DRUGS AND PROSTITUTION - SELECT COMMITTEE
Second Interim Report - Feasibility Study on the Controlled Availability of Opioids
Debate resumed.
MR MOORE: The failure of prohibition policies means that the costs to our community are exorbitant. We are aware that we in the ACT pay something like $40,000 per person that is incarcerated in New South Wales. Supposedly, that is a fair measure of the cost for a year of incarceration. The evidence to our committee has indicated that over 60 per cent of people in New South Wales gaols are, in fact, there for some form of drug related offence. That is an astronomical drain on our community, before you even look at the amount of money that goes into police enforcement, the courts and so forth.
Each of the committees that I referred to earlier has sought to find some alternative method - with the exception of the Williams Royal Commission, which in fact suggested that more money should be spent on the legal approach and prohibition to make it work. That is the only one that came up with that suggestion. In fact, Senator Baume, in commenting on that royal commission, said that the Liberal Prime Minister of the day, instead of coming out and saying, "They have got it wrong and we disagree", did something much more clever by appointing a conservative person, Williams, to conduct that royal commission. In that way, he said, he undermined all the work of the Baume committee. There may be some truth in that or it may be sour grapes. But the point is that the Williams Royal Commission, along with these other inquiries, raised questions; and it is those questions that our committee believes should be answered. It is very important to do that carefully and in a rigorous way.
While we have had a failure of prohibition worldwide, there has, of course, been a success in Australia and it was brought about by Dr Neal Blewett, who was then Minister for Health. His success was to introduce NCADA and the approach of harm minimisation. That has been one of the most successful approaches. Certainly, many observers
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .