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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 9 Hansard (2 September) . . Page.. 2761 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

a network marketing system. In the same way as people sell Amway or Avon or those sorts of things, the drug sale system relies on finding friends and acquaintances and getting them to buy the drugs as well. It requires a recognition of that.

Before we set about a system of controlled availability which will undermine such a network marketing system, it seems to me that we should be looking very carefully at what would happen if we tried to undermine it, in the case of heroin, by providing heroin to dependent users. Would it ameliorate the terrible problems associated with the illicit drug trade? Whilst undermining the black market, would it bring about a situation where we get worse health outcomes or better health outcomes? To me, that is why the heroin trial was important. It was important to assess whether we should take that bigger step in dealing with the illicit drug trade. But it stood on its own. It stood on its own in such a way that we could say, "Yes, we can find out about this policy to see whether we will get anywhere".

One of the delightful things as far as I was concerned, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, was that when people in this Assembly spoke on the report of the heroin task force, which was released in January 1996, the members who did speak were very supportive. In fact, the only people I heard comment on that were Mr Osborne and Mr Cornwell who, in different public media statements, said the issue of the heroin trial had never been debated in the Assembly. I presume they meant that the issue of the heroin trial had not been brought to a vote in the Assembly. They are two entirely different things. This issue had been debated and the matter is sitting on the notice paper.

Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, what we are dealing with in Australia, as the Chief Minister drew attention to, is a cost of $18 billion a year in dealing with drugs. That is a finding of a Mr John Walker from the Australian Institute of Criminology - not to be confused with our own senior public servant, Mr John Walker. We can extrapolate from that, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, that that is about $1,000 per citizen in Australia per year. With 300,000 people in Canberra, we are talking about $300m a year as the cost of dealing with drugs in this community of Canberra alone. It is a huge sum of money. Obviously, $300m is about a third of our budget, so it is not the money that we spend; it is the cost in a whole series of ways to our community. It is an extraordinary sum of money.

Mrs Carnell, in her speech, drew attention to future directions. In her third point on the National Drug Strategy Committee principles she drew attention to the importance of the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy, the MCDS, as a forum for intergovernmental decisions on drug issues affecting health and law enforcement. Mrs Carnell, I have to say to you, "Sorry, this is a joke". The National Drug Strategy Committee may believe that the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy is important, and it may have been important for the last 10 years. Indeed, you might have thought it was important and I might have thought it was important. Indeed, I have. But the reality is that the Prime Minister does not think it is important. The Prime Minister is simply dismissive of this ministerial council. What does that send as a message - the Prime Minister is very keen about sending messages - to every other ministerial council, whether it is a ministerial council on roads, a ministerial council on legislation or whatever, and there is a whole range of them?

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