Page 1806 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 19 August 1992
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That leads to the next argument, an argument that was held most strongly in the report on marijuana brought down by the Select Committee on HIV, Illegal Drugs and Prostitution in October 1991. That committee, which I am proud of chairing, held that the most important, significant harm-minimisation approach to the use of drugs would be to separate the markets. Here the argument is that when the police have been successful in destroying major crops of marijuana, when there has been a drying up of supply, as we have seen, the same dealers who distribute marijuana are able to approach people with amphetamines. There certainly have been times in the ACT when the price of amphetamines has been significantly lower than the price of marijuana. Whilst marijuana does have its problems and its side effects - and I think it is important that we do recognise that - the dangers associated with marijuana are nowhere near as high as the dangers associated with amphetamines. I will come back to that point if I have time later.
The next argument is the encroachment on civil liberties. Of course, most of us recognise that in the name of the war on drugs there have been significant encroachments on civil liberties. Somebody who has been accused of being a drug user or a drug dealer is of the lowest order in our social context. Of course, they are in an even worse position if they happen to be female, black or gay or if they perhaps make a living from prostitution. It comes back to the notion that the war on drugs is a war in which there are winners and losers and we need to think about just who the losers are and who the winners are. As Australians we as a group have seen infringement of our civil liberties through a series of international treaties which take away our right to legislate. Currently, there is a proposed international treaty which, if ratified, will severely restrict our path to drug law reform. It is an international treaty that ought not be ratified lightly.
The final argument is the argument about expensive court appearances. In South Australia, it was the driving argument behind the introduction of this style of legislation. In the ACT, because of the positive approach that the Federal Police have taken in this area - our 1989 drugs of dependence legislation has had a lower penalty for marijuana - the costs of court appearances are not the most significant factor in this step to law reform. In fact, it could well be said that the first step has already been taken. However, they are a significant factor and they must be taken into account.
The main argument that I have heard recently against drug policy reform is that when there was a relaxation of the laws in Alaska there was a major increase in the use of cannabis. This issue is dealt with by Russell Fox and Ian Mathews, who researched the notion. I read from the top of page 233 of Drugs Policy : Fact, Fiction and the Future, where it states:
We have mentioned the position in Alaska where the privacy requirement of its constitution led some years ago to the freedom of people to possess and use cannabis in the home. After much investigation and debate it is accepted that this did not result in a significant increase. Contemporaneously, however, there was a decrease in heroin use.
When people make statements like that, they really need to be looked at with some scepticism. The argument that was put in the Canberra Times and again the other day in a debate that I had with Pastor McCartney in Eyewitness News was that we need to dry up the supply so that our kids do not "wind up with
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