Howard unveils 'zero tolerance' drug strategy
By Sean Healy
John Howard has unveiled his latest "anti-drug" strategy, which includes a new funding package of $102 million and a hand-picked Australian National Council on Drugs. The extra funding is on top of $89.5 million allocated last November.
The destination of the funding clearly reveals the nature of the government's strategy. The largest part of it, $95 million, will go to further police services to "target each step in the drug chain". Of the remainder, $39 million goes to the National Council on Drugs and $55 million to treatment services.
The government's stated "tough on drugs" strategy is one of "zero tolerance", of seeking to further criminalise drugs and the people who use them. It is a step away from the drug education campaigns run over the last decade, which have generally been based on "harm minimisation".
The strategy follows last year's cabinet decision to scrap funding for an ACT government heroin trial, which would have experimented with issuing free heroin to a specific number of drug users. It also follows growing discussion and support for moves towards legalising certain classes of drugs, specifically marijuana but also heroin and other "hard" drugs.
The "community education campaign" to be run by the National Council on Drugs will focus on encouraging drug users, and especially young people, to "just say no" to drugs. Programs which discuss safe drug use, such as campaigns against shared needles, would be out.
The chairperson of the Drugs Council, Salvation Army Major Brian Watters, accepted this brief for his council: "We have to meet the prime minister's agenda, and he has made it clear what he wants". Conservative moralism is the order of the day.
Such a campaign will probably be about as successful as a "say no to sex" campaign aimed at lowering HIV infection rates.