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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 9 Hansard (1 September) . . Page.. 2674 ..
MR RUGENDYKE (continuing):
During my career in the police force I dealt regularly with kids who had been hooked on cannabis and I continue to be contacted by parents who are at a total loss in trying to come to terms with drastic personality changes in their children who are habitual cannabis users. Cannabis dependency is tearing families apart and it is time for this Assembly to stand up and do something about it. The relaxed cannabis laws have not made us a better community.
Police Community Relations wrote in a recent Neighbourhood Watch newsletter that one of the most common incorrect assumptions raised with them is that cannabis in small quantities is legal. It all starts with education but, unfortunately, the kids are getting the wrong message. Mr Speaker, this is at odds with the draft drug strategy for ACT government schools released earlier this year. The key aim of this strategy is to stop kids taking drugs in the first place. Unfortunately, kids are not afraid to try marijuana because of the confusing message our current laws are sending.
Cannabis is not regulated. When people smoke marijuana they do not know how strong it is. They do not know exactly what they are putting into their heads and bodies. The technology available today makes the level of toxic chemicals in cannabis, called THC, much greater than it was previously. Cannabis is much stronger today and it increases the prospects of scrambling young brains.
According to the national drug strategy household survey of 1995, the ACT has the second highest usage of cannabis in Australia. We have a huge problem here and I do not believe that certain members of the Assembly are reading the community frustration. Kids Helpline, a national counselling service for 5- to 18-year-olds, released information in April that the proportion of calls from the ACT concerning drug use was 36 per cent greater than the national average. The proportion of calls from the ACT concerning drug use is the highest in the country and the majority of the concerns came from females.
Mr Speaker, when Cheryl Vardon was leaving Canberra in 1996, the former head of the Department of Education said that there had to be increased energy diverted to drug education. In an article published in the Canberra Times at that time she said:
I think that the atmosphere in the ACT around drugs is a little permissive. And that can have a really, really big impact on adolescents as they're growing up - and even young children - so that they think it's okay.
Ms Vardon said that drug prevention was the most serious issue facing schools and young people in the ACT. She went on to say:
It's all very well for adults to talk about drugs and management and needle-exchange programs and all those things that are needed, and improving the methadone program and so on. But it just gives a bit of an air of "Let's just experiment" or "It's not as bad as all that".
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