Page 3251 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 21 September 1994
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In case you're wondering, there is no THC or "high" in hemp fiber. That's right, you can't smoke your shirt! In fact, attempting to smoke hemp fabric - or any fabric, for that matter - could be fatal!
So, I do not think that anyone should try to smoke Mr Stevenson's coat or set it on fire, because that could be fatal.
Mr Humphries: To him or to us?
MR STEFANIAK: Perhaps to Mr Stevenson. I am not too sure how it burns, but that could be a bit of a problem too. I also have a document from Biological Products Pty Ltd, which my colleague the Leader of the Opposition received on 12 September. It pushes the use of hemp, indicating that 160,000 hectares of hemp is currently cultivated annually in Europe and in England. That particular company, which operates out of Potts Point, is trying to set up in Australia and get people in various departments interested - - -
Mr De Domenico: Potts Point?
MR STEFANIAK: Potts Point, not Pot Point, Mr De Domenico. It is trying to set up in Australia and interest, among other departments, the New South Wales departments of health and agriculture. I have some idea, having smelt cannabis and marijuana before - - -
Mr Humphries: You did not inhale, did you?
MR STEFANIAK: It is none of your business. This paper smells no different from any sort of recycled paper. I am reliably informed by the document itself that it is made in Europe with 100 per cent hemp. So, there might well be some merit in Mr Stevenson's idea, and it should certainly not be dismissed out of hand. It is worth investigating.
Mr Moore made a number of points with which I certainly would not agree, but he made a number of other points which are worth while. In Tasmania, poppies that are exactly the same as the opium poppy are cultivated for morphine. It is a big industry down there. It is interesting to look at what occurs in Tasmania when one is considering the use of illegal drugs and opiates. Marijuana, which is hemp or cannabis with a high THC factor, is not a legal drug in Canberra or in any other part of the Commonwealth of Australia. I do not know whether this is still the case. It certainly was up until about two years ago. I recall from my days as a prosecutor and even back in my days as a defence counsel that, although poppies from which you can make opium are produced in Tasmania, the only drug that is actually produced and sold within Australia is cannabis. Even cannabis resin is imported. Heroin and the hard opiates are all imported - illegally, of course. It would seem that, through effective controls, whatever is produced in Tasmania from the poppies there has not been siphoned off or used in an internal Australian drug market. Our drug problem in Australia is bad enough already, without anything like that happening. There might well be some scope within Australia, including within the ACT, for Mr Stevenson's idea of reintroducing hemp as an actual plant. That is something that should not be pooh-poohed out of hand. It does bear investigation, certainly when one looks at what has occurred in Tasmania.
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