Jennifer Norberry
Law and Bills Digest Group
20 May 1997
Contents
Major Issues Summary
Introduction
Major Illicit Drugs-What are they, how are
they used and what are their effects?
Cannabis
Heroin
Lysergic Acid Diethylamide (LSD)
Amphetamines
Cocaine
Illicit Drugs: Consumption, Costs and Public
Opinion
Street Prices of Illicit Drugs
Use of Illicit Drugs in Australia
Death and Drug Use
The Costs of Illicit Drug Use and Policies in Australia
The Criminal Justice System, Crime and Illicit Drugs
Attitudes to Illicit Drug Laws in Australia
Australian Illicit Drug Laws
Early Drug Laws in Australia
International Influences
The 1960s and 1970s
The 1980s
The 1990s and Beyond
National Task Force on Cannabis
Feasibility Research into the Controlled Availability of
Heroin
South Australian Select Committee on the Control and Illegal
Use of Drugs of Dependence
Western Australian Task Force on Drug Abuse
Report of the Victorian Premier's Drug Advisory Council
Northern Territory Misuse of Drugs Amendment Act 1996
Concluding Remarks
Glossary
Endnotes
Alcohol and tobacco are drugs and account for the overwhelming
number of drug-related deaths in Australia. A recent survey
conducted by the National Drug Strategy found that the public
identifies alcohol and tobacco as the drugs causing the most deaths
in Australia and as being the drugs of most concern to them.
However, when asked to name the drugs they thought of when people
talked about a 'drug problem', about two-thirds of those sampled
mentioned cannabis and heroin, followed by cocaine, alcohol,
amphetamines and tobacco. The Australian public also differentiates
between illicit drugs(1) and between consumers and sellers of
drugs. It appears to favour heavy penalties for the sale and supply
of illicit drugs and opposes the legalisation of personal use of
heroin and cocaine. However, nearly one third of people recently
surveyed for the National Drug Strategy supported legalising
personal use of cannabis.
Australia's illicit drug laws were slow to develop and evolved
in response to three stimuli: anti-Chinese prejudice in the late
19th century, international treaties and the influence of
Australia's allies such as the United States, and the growth of
recreational and dependent use of illicit drugs in the 1960s and
1970s.
In 19th century Australia a wide range of drugs, including
opiates, were available to the public from doctors, pharmacists,
homoeopaths, grocers and sellers of proprietary medicines. What are
today classified as illicit drugs were available in medicines, for
example, opium and morphine in Bonnington's Irish Moss. The medical
profession had not yet come to dominate the provision of health
services; self-treatment was common and dependence on opium or
cocaine was generally therapeutically induced.(2) It has been
suggested that the profile of drug dependence in Australia at the
turn of the century was similar to that of other nations with the
typical dependent user being a middle class, middle aged woman or
health professional. This user profile remained largely unchanged
until the 1960s.
Since the 1970s, legislators and policy makers have debated the
issue of the appropriateness and effectiveness of the criminal law
as a means of combating illicit drug use-especially the use of
cannabis. Numerous inquiries have been undertaken and they continue
to be established. The 1995 Western Australian Task Force on Drug
Abuse identified 15 major inquiries into drug abuse in Australia
since 1970. To this list could be added inquiries in the ACT,
Queensland, South Australia, Victoria and Western Australia itself.
Among other things, these inquiries examined:
- the provision of drug treatment and education services;
- the use of licit and illicit drugs and the social consequences
of that use;
- links between organised crime and drug trafficking;
- the use of prescription drugs;
- policy options for dealing with illicit drugs; and
- the consequences of a prohibitionist approach to drugs.
In 1985, the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse was
established as ' ... a cooperative venture between all governments
and the non-government sector with the common aim "to minimise the
harmful effects of drugs and drug use in Australian Society."'(3)
The National Campaign Against Drug Abuse and its successor, the
National Drug Strategy, have fulfilled important roles in raising
awareness, in policy development and in the collection of data
about the use of drugs (including alcohol and tobacco) and about
community attitudes to them. Australia is seen as a world leader in
harm reduction approaches to drug use. However, many questions
remain to be answered about how best to respond to the illicit drug
problem in Australia. In the past, some adversaries in the debate
about illicit drugs have contented themselves with either attacking
the policy of drug prohibition as a failure or contending that all
illicit drugs are harmful and must be proscribed.
Fortunately, there may be a growing recognition that research
and evaluation can play a vital part in informing discussions and
decisions about illicit drug laws and policies. Such research is
important:
- in identifying who uses illicit drugs and how and why they use
them;
- in assessing whether illicit drug treatment programs and
educational campaigns are working and how they can be
improved;
- in evaluating existing drug laws;
- in conducting comparative research and evaluation; and
- in testing the claims of reformers either through assessing
existing 'reformist' legislation or by establishing and evaluating
carefully controlled treatment trials.
It is difficult to imagine a response to illicit drugs that does
not include law enforcement. Research and evaluation also have a
significant role to play in determining how law enforcement can
most effectively deal with the presence of illicit drugs in
Australian society. Such investigations can contribute to the
implementation of illicit drug laws and policies that are
appropriate for Australia and meet our international treaty
obligations.
Illicit drugs continue to be in the news with the work of the
Wood Royal Commission in New South Wales, proposals for a heroin
trial in the ACT, the establishment of a Premier's Drug Advisory
Council in Victoria and a Task Force on Drug Abuse in Western
Australia, and the introduction of infringement notices for minor
cannabis offences in the Northern Territory. Possession, supply and
manufacture of illicit drugs are largely dealt with under State and
Territory legislation. However, the Commonwealth is also closely
involved with illicit drugs policy, research and laws-for example,
through the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy(4) and the
National Drug Strategy, the Standing Committee on
Attorneys-General, as a consequence of Commonwealth powers over
imports and exports, and by virtue of international treaty
obligations.(5) The Commonwealth has also assisted United Nations
efforts against illicit drug use and trafficking-for example,
through its contributions to the United Nations Fund for Drug Abuse
Control.
There is also the potential for the Commonwealth to play a
greater role in enacting illicit drug laws through the use of its
external affairs power in section 51(xxix) of the Constitution and,
in the case of the ACT and the Northern Territory, by virtue of the
plenary power contained in section 122 of the Constitution. In
addition, should the States enact drug laws that the Commonwealth
considered to be in breach of its international treaty obligations,
there is the possibility that the Commonwealth could enact
legislation that would make those laws inoperative as a result of
section 109 of the Constitution.
Drugs are defined by the World Health Organization as 'any
chemical entity or mixture of entities used for treatment or
alleviation of disease, or for non-therapeutic purposes.
Psychoactive drugs are those that alter mood, cognition or
behaviour.'(6) The term 'drugs' thus includes licit substances such
as alcohol, tobacco, prescription and over-the-counter medication,
as well as illicit substances such as cannabis and heroin.
Alcohol is the most frequently used drug in Australia. There is
also a high rate of tobacco consumption. The social and individual
harms associated with the use of alcohol and tobacco have been
extensively publicised and documented by the National Drug
Strategy. Since the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse was
established in 1985, there has been a three-fold increase in the
number of people who identify alcohol as part of the drug
problem.(7) It appears that far fewer people associate tobacco with
the 'drug problem.' Illicit and licit drugs have at least one thing
in common-if abused or incorrectly used they are potentially
dangerous to human health.
Illicit drugs continue to be seen by Australians as the major
component of the drug problem(8) and are the subject of this paper.
It describes some of the major illicit drugs, their use, effects,
and the costs of drug laws and public attitudes to them. It then
gives an historical account of illicit drugs legislation in
Australia, and briefly outlines current law and some recent
examinations of drug law reform. The paper does not deal with
performance enhancing drugs such as anabolic steroids. Anabolic
steroids are the subject of an earlier Research Service
paper.(9)
Cannabis
Marijuana, hashish and hashish oil come from the Indian Hemp
plant (cannabis sativa) and contain the psychoactive
chemical THC. Cannabis leaf and the flowering tops of the cannabis
plant are dried before use and are commonly referred to as
marijuana or cannabis. Hashish or cannabis resin is extracted from
the cannabis plant and compressed into blocks. Hashish oil is
distilled from the cannabis plant or from cannabis resin and
generally has the highest THC content of all cannabis products. It
appears that cannabis seeds arrived in Australia with the First
Fleet.(10) Most cannabis in Australia is grown domestically,(11)
although cannabis products such as hashish and hashish oil are also
imported.(12) Marijuana and hashish are usually smoked but can also
be eaten.
The cannabis plant was cultivated for thousands of years to
produce textiles, paper, rope and bowstrings, and was thus
important in both commerce and warfare. It was also used in China
as early as the second century BC as an anaesthetic, and in India
and Asia Minor in religious ceremonies and as a medicine. There is
currently a resurgence of international interest in the cultivation
of cannabis with a low THC content for paper and cloth, and some
trial cultivation projects for these uses have been commenced in
Australia.(13) In the United States and the ACT there have also
been recent calls to legalise the medical use of cannabis.
In 1994, a literature review entitled The Health and
Psychological Consequences of Cannabis Use was published by
the National Drug Strategy.(14) It identifies a number of acute and
chronic effects of cannabis use. Acute effects-that is, effects
experienced in the short-term-include mild euphoria and relaxation,
impairment of short-term memory, anxiety, depression, and
impairment of motor skills such as driving. In susceptible
individuals, there may be an increased risk of psychosis. There is
some evidence that chronic cannabis use may result in minor
impairment to the immune system and produce dependence on the drug,
that it should not be used by those with cardiovascular disease or
hypertension, and that its use in pregnancy may result in low
birthweight infants. Research suggests that chronic cannabis
smoking predisposes users to bronchitis and lung cancer.
There is also evidence of an association between cannabis use
and fatal traffic accidents. The Western Australian Task Force on
Drug Abuse recently studied 197 traffic fatalities involving drugs
which act on the central nervous system. Cannabis was found either
alone or in combination with alcohol or other drugs in 48.6% of
these accidents.(15)
The 1994 National Drug Strategy review concluded that
adolescents should be discouraged from regularly using cannabis
because of the drug's potential to impair educational performance.
Some studies find evidence that chronic cannabis use in adults
produces apathy but other writers conclude that such effects, if
they exist, are relatively rare.
Heroin
Heroin was first synthesised in England in 1874 and is
manufactured from morphine, a drug derived from the opium poppy.
Opium poppy for the illicit drugs market is grown in the Golden
Triangle (Burma, Laos and Thailand); the Golden Crescent (Pakistan,
Afghanistan and Iran); the Middle East and South America. Most
heroin seized in Australia comes from the Golden Triangle.
Heroin is usually injected, although it can also be inhaled or
smoked. It produces what is called a 'rush' in the user-a feeling
of intense euphoria. This is followed by feelings of drowsiness and
lethargy. Heroin is classified as a narcotic. It does not produce
hallucinations like LSD. Its effects are described in the following
way in the Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Drugs:
Regular users often say that heroin
makes them feel 'peaceful', 'painless', 'protected', 'warm' and
'worry-free.' But users frequently have difficulties maintaining
their concentration and alertness while under the
influence.(16)
The dangers of heroin use include dependence, fatal overdose,
collapsed veins, septicaemia and the transmission of diseases such
as hepatitis B, hepatitis C and HIV through unsafe injecting
practices. Other reported short-term adverse effects of heroin use
include nausea, vomiting, itching and constipation, with long-term
users risking the possibility of respiratory, reproductive and
gastrointestinal diseases.(17)
Some of these consequences may be associated with the fact that
because heroin is an illicit substance, users cannot predict its
purity or know whether it has been adulterated with other more
toxic material. Pure heroin itself is relatively harmless to the
body.(18) However, heroin users rarely consume the drug in a pure
form. It is likely to be cut (mixed) with other
substances-including talcum powder, starch, baking powder, quinine
and sometimes strychnine. This adds to the harms associated with
heroin use for a number of reasons. Adulterants added to heroin may
themselves be toxic and cause health problems or users may overdose
because the heroin they use is purer than they expect-a problem
recently experienced by heroin users in Australia. Lastly, users
tend to inject rather than smoke or sniff heroin when the price is
high (one of the consequences of illegality) and the purity is low.
Unsafe injecting drug use brings with it the risk of the
transmission of serious disease.
Heroin was (and in some countries still is) used as an analgesic
for severe pain, in terminal illness and in childbirth. It has also
been prescribed for its calming and sleep-inducing properties.
However, there is controversy about the medical use of heroin,
especially in relation to whether it is a more effective painkiller
than other derivatives of opium such as morphine.
Lysergic Acid Diethylamide (LSD)
LSD is a synthetic drug first produced by Dr Albert Hoffman in
1938. It is synthesised from lysergic acid which itself is obtained
from ergot, a fungus that grows on rye grass. Its use as a
recreational drug dates from the 1960s.
LSD is manufactured in clandestine laboratories in the United
States, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Most commonly,
microdots or paper impregnated with LSD are taken orally. LSD can
also be injected, inhaled or absorbed through the skin.
LSD is classified as an hallucinogen. Its effects include
depersonalisation, loss of body image, a dream-like state, changes
in spatial perceptions, synaesthesia, distortions of time, lack of
concentration, impairment of judgement, euphoria and despair. A bad
LSD 'trip' may produce terror, panic or aggression. LSD also
induces a wide range of physiological changes including elevated
heart rate, blood pressure, blood sugar and body temperature;
dilation of the pupils; muscular weakness; tremors and
twitching.
Early scientific research sought to determine whether LSD was
useful as a painkiller, for psychiatric disorders and for
palliative treatment in terminally ill patients. It is not
currently used for any of these purposes.
Amphetamines
Amphetamines were first produced in 1887 in the form of the
synthetic drug benzedrine. Employed initially as a nasal
decongestant and in the treatment of bronchitis and asthma,
amphetamines today have few medical uses. These include appetite
suppression, and the treatment of narcolepsy and juvenile
hyperactivity. Recreational use of amphetamines probably began in
the 1920s when amphetamine tablets appeared in pharmacies.
The term 'amphetamines' covers a wide range of synthetic
psychostimulants including MDA, MDEA, MDMA (ecstasy),
methamphetamine and PMA. After cannabis, amphetamines are probably
the most widely used illicit drugs in Australia. They are thought
to be a more attractive psychostimulant than cocaine because, being
manufactured domestically and not having to pass through the
customs barrier, they are cheaper than cocaine and more readily
available.
Amphetamines are produced in powder, liquid, tablet and capsule
form. They can be inhaled, swallowed, injected or smoked.
Amphetamines are regarded as hallucinogenic stimulants. They
increase heart rate, blood pressure and respiration rates, suppress
appetite, boost confidence and energy, and often depress the desire
to sleep or eat. Once the 'high' associated with amphetamines wears
off, the user may feel tired, depressed and irritable. Heavy use of
amphetamines may produce mood swings, impair concentration,
increase anxiety and energy levels, and lead to panic attacks or
violence.(19)
Ecstasy or MDMA (3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine) is an
amphetamine. It was first synthesised in 1914. Its original uses
were medical. It does not appear to have been used recreationally
until the 1980s.
Ecstasy is usually available as tablets or capsules. It leads to
mild hallucinations, increased heart beat, elevated blood pressure,
and a sense of well-being. At high doses it produces confusion,
anxiety, sweating, respiratory problems, hallucinations and
cardiovascular effects. If used regularly, it is reported to cause
brain haemorrhage and damage to major organs such as the heart and
liver.
Ecstasy is used at 'rave parties' where, in combination with
energetic dancing, it may lead to heatstroke or, if too much water
is drunk by the user, to death through water intoxication.(20) Such
deaths have been reported in Australia -most prominently, that of
Sydney schoolgirl, Anna Woods, in 1995.
More ecstasy is being imported into Australia. As recently as
1993, there were few seizures of ecstasy at the customs barrier. In
1994, 2.9 kilograms were seized. However, in the period January to
August 1996, 29.9 kilograms were seized.(21)
Cocaine
Cocaine is produced from coca, a plant which has been grown in
South America for at least 2,000 years. Coca leaf is still used
today in South America to relieve hunger, fatigue, and cold.
In the later half of the 19th century, cocaine was widely used
in patent medicines, alcohol and soft drinks. Until 1909 it was an
ingredient of Coca-Cola. It was also prescribed by Sigmund Freud as
a cure for alcohol and opium dependence. In medical practice,
synthetics such as novocaine and xylocaine have largely replaced
natural cocaine.
Cocaine is a stimulant and comes in a variety of forms, but in
Australia it is most commonly available as a white powder (cocaine
hydrochloride). When used recreationally cocaine powder is usually
inhaled. However, it is also sometimes injected, smoked or drunk.
It produces euphoria, enhances sensation and heightens confidence
in mental and physical powers. There is some dispute about whether
cocaine use can lead to physical dependence. However, there is
agreement that it can produce psychological dependence and, in
chronic users:
hyperstimulation, digestive
disorders, nausea, loss of appetite, weight loss, occasional
convulsions, and sometimes paranoid psychoses and delusions of
persecution. Moreover, repeated inhalation can result in erosions
of the mucous membranes, including perforations of the nasal
septum.(22)
Crack cocaine is made from cocaine powder, baking powder and
water and is smoked by users. Its cost per unit is generally lower
than cocaine powder and it produces a rapid and intense 'high.'(23)
At any dosage, the use of crack cocaine carries the potential for
serious and life-threatening effects including convulsions,
depression, and cardiovascular disorders such as heart attack and
stroke.(24)
Cocaine is imported into Australia from South America, generally
via the United States. There is little evidence of crack cocaine in
Australia. In 1994, the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence
reported that there had been no seizures of crack by law
enforcement agencies in Australia and 'no incidence of "crack"
availability' in either 1993 or 1994.(25)
Street Prices of Illicit Drugs
Prices of illicit drugs may vary from jurisdiction to
jurisdiction and according to quality. The Australian Bureau of
Criminal Intelligence produces information on State and Territory
drug prices. In the period April 1996 to June 1996, prices in the
ACT were estimated to be:
- cannabis leaf -1 gram -$25;
- cannabis leaf -1 ounce -$350;
- heroin -1 gram street -$450;
- amphetamines -1 gram street -$100;
- ecstasy -$25;
- LSD -1 tablet -$25;
- cocaine -1 gram street -$250-$300.(26)
Use of Illicit Drugs in Australia
Cannabis is the most frequently used illicit drug in Australia.
In December 1993, a survey of some 1,600 Australians was
conducted.(27) Approximately 39 per cent of those who responded had
used cannabis at some time; about 16 per cent had used cannabis
during the previous year, and some 6 per cent had used cannabis in
the previous two weeks. Another larger sample obtained at the same
time produced somewhat lower figures. In this survey, 3,500
Australians were sampled for the National Drug Strategy Household
Survey. Thirty-four per cent of the sample reported having used
cannabis at some time in their lives.(28) The most recent household
survey conducted by the National Drug Strategy was carried out in
1995. The 1995 survey found that 31 per cent of those sampled who
were aged over 14 years had tried cannabis at some time.(29) These
data compare to about 12 per cent of adults who reported ever
having used cannabis in 1973.(30)
According to recent national surveys, lifetime and recent use of
cannabis is highest in the Northern Territory and lowest in
Queensland. In South Australia, which introduced legislation
decriminalising minor cannabis offences in 1986, and the ACT which
introduced similar legislation in 1992, lifetime and recent use of
cannabis appears not to be significantly different to that in other
jurisdictions.(31)
In comparison with cannabis, far fewer Australians have ever
used heroin, cocaine, amphetamines or hallucinogens. In 1991, a
survey of almost 2,500 Australians was conducted for the National
Campaign Against Drug Abuse. Of those surveyed, more than 98 per
cent reported never having used heroin and 97 per cent said they
had never used cocaine.(32) Ninety-three per cent said they had
never used hallucinogens and 92.6 per cent reported never having
used amphetamines. The 1993 National Drug Strategy Household Survey
found that 1.7 per cent of the population had tried heroin, 2.4 per
cent had used cocaine, five per cent had used amphetamines, seven
per cent had used hallucinogens and three per cent had tried
ecstasy or designer drugs.(33) The 1995 Household Survey revealed
that 1.4 per cent of the population had ever tried heroin, three
per cent had tried cocaine, 6 per cent had tried amphetamines, 7
per cent had tried hallucinogens and 2.4 per cent had tried ecstasy
or designer drugs.(34)
The number of Australians who have recently (ie in the last 12
months) used cocaine, heroin, amphetamines, hallucinogens or
designer drugs is also small. The 1995 National Drug Strategy
Household Survey found that 0.9 per cent of the population have
used cocaine recently, 0.4 per cent have used heroin recently, 2.1
per cent have used amphetamines recently, 2.0 per cent have used
hallucinogens recently and 0.8 per cent have used ecstasy or
designer drugs recently.
What are the socioeconomic characteristics of drug users? Some
recent research which has been done involving injecting drug users
casts doubts on traditional ideas. Injecting drug use is often
associated with chaotic lifestyles, unemployment and poor
education. Australian studies have tended to bear out these views.
One Western Australian study of injecting drug users who had been
in treatment found that only 24 per cent had completed secondary
schooling and about 80 per cent were unemployed.(35) However, more
recent work suggests that the profile of injecting drug users who
have had little or no experience in drug treatment may be
different. Two researchers from the National Centre for Research
into the Prevention of Drug Abuse found that 44 per cent of such
drug users were married or living with their sexual partner, nearly
24 per cent had finished high school, about 22 per cent had
completed trade or technical school education, nearly 7 per cent
had finished a university or college course, 46 per cent were
employed and nearly 17 per cent owned or were buying their own
home.(36)
Death and Drug Use
Since 1985, the Commonwealth Department of Human Services and
Health has published statistics on abuse of licit and illicit
drugs. It is estimated that almost one in five deaths in 1992 were
caused by the use of licit or illicit drugs. Of these, 72 per cent
were caused by tobacco, about 25 per cent by alcohol and 3 per cent
by illicit drugs.(37)
The role of illicit drug use in causing death in the community
varies according to age group. While in 1992, 1 per cent of
drug-related deaths in the population aged over 35 years were
caused by illicit drug use, about 34 per cent of drug related
deaths in the 13-34 year age group were caused by illicit drugs.
Unsafe injecting drug use may also cause death through the
transmission of HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C and thus
contribute to an increase in illicit drug-related mortality in the
future.(38)
Different conclusions have been drawn from statistics like those
cited above. For some commentators the statistics indicate that
illicit drugs are less dangerous than licit substances such as
tobacco and alcohol. For others, they demonstrate the effectiveness
of prohibition in controlling drug-related mortality.(39)
The Costs of Illicit Drug Use and Policies in Australia
There are many difficulties in trying to assess the economic and
social costs of illicit drug use in Australia. A number of attempts
have been made.
In its report Drugs, Crime and Society, the
Parliamentary Joint Committee on the National Crime Authority
estimated law enforcement costs associated with illicit drug use at
$123.2 million in 1987-88. This included costs of the Australian
Federal Police, the National Crime Authority, the Australian
Customs Service, State police services, prisons and the courts.
Other writers also attempted to estimate the costs of law
enforcement for 1988-these estimates range from $258 million(40) to
$319.6 million.(41)
More recently, the National Drug Strategy published The
Social Costs of Drug Abuse in Australia in 1988 and 1992. The
authors of this work estimate that the tangible economic costs of
illicit drug abuse(42) (in 1988 prices) for 1988 were $908.4
million and for 1992, $1119.7 million-an increase of 23.3 per cent.
These costs do not include ambulance services, welfare, absenteeism
or crime, as the authors regard such matters as unquantifiable.
About one-third of the tangible economic costs were law enforcement
costs.(43) The balance of quantifiable costs were net production
costs and health care costs. Production costs are the costs to
production that flow from drug-related death and illness adjusted
for such things as consumption resources made available to the
community through premature deaths. Health care costs include the
costs of medical services, hospital and nursing home beds adjusted
for the savings that result from death and illness due to illicit
drug use.
The Criminal Justice System, Crime and Illicit Drugs
A recent study entitled The Social Impacts of the
Legislative Options for Cannabis Use in Australia,(44)
collated nationwide figures on the law enforcement and criminal
justice system response to cannabis use. The study concluded that
the majority of illicit drug use offences in Australia are for
possession or use of cannabis. It is estimated that more than
47,000 cannabis use/possession offences will be detected and
reported by the police nationally each year. For those who are
charged with possession or use of cannabis, the most likely outcome
is a fine. It appears that very few offenders are imprisoned for
minor cannabis offences such as use or possession. That this is so,
is a source of concern among some commentators and members of the
public who criticise lack of rigorous enforcement of the law on the
basis that it brings the law into disrepute.
According to the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence,
nearly 80 per cent of drug-related arrests in Australia are for
cannabis offences. Heroin-related arrests total about 7 per cent of
drug-related arrests in Australia, amphetamines account for about 4
per cent of drug-related arrests, cocaine 0.33 per cent, anabolic
steroids 0.07 per cent and other drugs account for about 8 per cent
of drug-related arrests.(45)
Illicit drug users are not only drawn into the criminal justice
system because drug use per se is illegal. They may commit
property offences to finance illicit drug use. However, the
relationship between crime and illicit drug use is not a simple
one. Criminological research indicates that illicit drug use itself
is not necessarily the trigger for a person to commit crimes: drug
users may have committed offences before they began using illicit
drugs. However, it does seem likely that once a person becomes an
illicit drug user he or she may commit offences more regularly in
order to pay for their 'drug habit.' Other data show that in
addition to dealing in drugs, the major sources of income for
heroin users include property crime, prostitution, shoplifting,
fraud and armed robbery.(46)
It is generally accepted that few illicit drugs cause drug users
to behave violently. As the National Committee on Violence
commented: 'The association which is observed between alcohol and
violent behaviour is rarely seen in the case of the most commonly
abused illicit drugs'.(47) One class of drugs that is generally
regarded as an exception to this observation is amphetamines.
The profit to be made from dealing in illicit drugs has the
potential to produce corruption in law enforcement agencies. This
potential has been remarked on in the Fitzgerald Report,(48) by the
Parliamentary Joint Committee on the National Crime Authority and
by NSW Royal Commissioner James Wood. Most recently, Royal
Commissioner Wood stated that drug trafficking was '...destroying
police on a State and Federal level, and there is absolutely no
reason to think it stops at New South Wales boundaries.'(49)
Finally, illicit drugs are a problem within Australia's prison
system. This is so for at least two reasons. Some offenders enter
prison with an existing drug habit. Others acquire a habit during
their incarceration because of the availability of drugs in gaol
and the boredom and stresses of prison life. Where their drug use
involves injecting, the likelihood is that injecting equipment will
be shared and either not cleaned effectively or at all, with the
attendant risk of disease transmission both inside the prison
system and outside once the offender is released. A review of harm
reduction strategies put it this way:
Over half the prison population in
Australia, about 14 000 at any one time, are IDUs [injecting drug
users] and about half of these can be expected to share needles
during their incarceration which is, on average, about 4 months. It
has been estimated that some needles at Long Bay prison complex are
in use 30-40 times per day.(50)
Attitudes to Illicit Drug Laws in Australia
Australian attitudes to the legal status of cannabis have been
surveyed since the 1960s-with results varying according to the
survey and the questions asked of respondents. It has been
estimated that in 1970 about 9 per cent of the population supported
legalisation of cannabis use. According to one study published in
1993,(51) about 1 in 4 Australians supported legalising cannabis
but some 65 per cent of the community supported an increase in
penalties for sale or supply of the drug. The respondents in this
survey expressed little support for the legalisation of other
illicit drugs such as cocaine, heroin or amphetamines.
In another study conducted in December 1993, between 52 and 55
per cent of those sampled believed that personal use of cannabis,
or possession for personal use, should be legal and some 75 per
cent of those surveyed felt that personal use of cannabis or
possession for personal use should not attract criminal
penalties.(52)
The 1993 National Drug Strategy Household Survey(53) found that
8 per cent of those surveyed supported the legalisation of personal
use of heroin, 87 per cent opposed it and 6 per cent were
undecided. In the same survey, 87 per cent of respondees supported
increased penalties for the sale or supply of heroin, 8 per cent
opposed this and 4 per cent were undecided. In the case of personal
use of amphetamines, 87 per cent opposed legalisation and, in the
case of personal use of cocaine, 89 per cent opposed legalisation.
This survey also found that about one quarter of those sampled
supported legalisation of the personal use of cannabis.
The 1995 Household Survey revealed that the public continues to
differentiate between cannabis and drugs such as heroin,
amphetamines and cocaine when asked for their response to the idea
that personal use of illicit drugs should be legalised. It also
appears that while support for legalisation of personal use of
cannabis has increased slightly (about one-third of respondents
supported legalisation), opposition to the legalisation of personal
use of other illicit drugs has become more marked since the 1993
Household Survey. Support for increased penalties for the sale and
supply of illicit drugs other than cannabis continues to be a
feature of public opinion.(54)
The 1993 National Drug Strategy Household Survey also sought
responses about drug policy options. Those taking part in the
survey were asked how they would allocate funds to drug education,
treatment or law enforcement if they had $100 to spend. For the
illicit drugs, the average amount allocated for
amphetamine/cocaine/heroin use was $45.70 for education, $26.50 for
treatment and $27.80 for law enforcement. For cannabis, the amounts
were $50.50 for education, $21.50 for treatment and $27.80 for law
enforcement.
The 1995 Household Survey also collected public opinion data on
how governments should spend their money on illicit drug programs
in order to reduce illicit drug use. Respondents thought that, for
every $100 spent on combating cannabis use, $45.80 should be spent
on education, $23.90 on treatment and $30.00 on law enforcement.
For heroin and cocaine the amounts were $35.90 for education,
$23.70 for treatment and $40.10 for law enforcement. The Survey
report concludes that 'A shift from education towards law
enforcement occurs for amphetamines and heroin/cocaine, with the
allocation to law enforcement exceeding that to education for
heroin/cocaine.'(55)
Early Drug Laws in Australia
In 19th century Australia a wide range of drugs, including
opiates, was available to the public from doctors, pharmacists,
homoeopaths, grocers and sellers of proprietary medicines.(56) The
medical profession had not yet come to dominate the provision of
health services; self-treatment was common and dependence on opium
or cocaine was generally therapeutically-induced.(57) It has been
suggested that the profile of drug dependence in Australia at the
turn of the century was similar to that of other nations, with the
typical dependent user being a middle-class, middle-aged woman or
health professional. This 'user' profile remained largely unchanged
until the 1960s.
Early regulation of drugs occurred by way of poisons laws which
imposed requirements on the sale and labelling of certain drugs. It
appears that these laws were a response to the use of drugs such as
arsenic in poisonings, suicides and homicides.(58) They did not
affect drug availability. According to one commentator, Australia
had the highest rate of consumption of proprietary medicines per
capita in the world at this time.(59)
In the early 20th century a Royal Commission was established by
the Commonwealth Government to inquire into Secret Drugs, Cures and
Foods.(60) Ingredients then used in proprietary medicines included
opium and morphine in Bonnington's Irish Moss; morphine in Cherry
Pectoral, Kay's Essence of Linseed and Winslow's Soothing Syrup;
and opium in Perry Davis' Painkiller, Atkinson's Royal Infant
Preservative and Ayer's Sarsparilla Mixture.
The Royal Commission criticised the lack of controls on the
composition and availability of proprietary medicines, advertising
claims, the use of preparations containing cocaine and opiates to
pacify infants and treat alcoholism, and their free availability to
adolescents and adults alike. Royal Commissioner Octavius Beale
said:
[Poisons] Acts are so loosely
administered that in Australia at least they are practically
inoperative with regard to the purchase of quack medicines which
contain scheduled poisons. The range of poisons outside of the
schedules, including those of the most virulent, dangerous, and
insidious character, is a hundredfold greater than of those
within.(61)
Although white Australians were substantial consumers of
cocaine, opiates and other drugs, Australia's earliest laws
prohibiting and penalising the non-medical consumption of drugs
targeted smokeable opium-a substance used primarily in the Chinese
community. These early illicit drug laws had their origins in
anti-Chinese prejudice and the temperance movement. They also
heralded the emergence of the medical professional as a powerful
pressure group, the decline of the proprietary medicine industry
and a movement away from laissez-faire government to
increased regulation of citizens.(62)
Queensland proscribed the sale of smokeable opium to Aboriginal
people under the Sale and Use of Poisons Act 1891. In
1895, South Australia prohibited all opium smoking. New South
Wales, Queensland and Victoria followed suit.(63) In general, these
laws banned opium smoking and the sale, trafficking, manufacture
and possession of opium suitable for smoking.
With the Federation of the Australian colonies in 1901, the
Commonwealth was empowered to deal with imports and exports and in
1905 banned the importation of opium suitable for smoking. In 1910,
the Commonwealth made it an offence to be in possession of a
prohibited import such as opium without reasonable excuse. The
burden of proving 'reasonable' excuse was placed on the
defendant.
International Influences
International influences, especially the emergence of
international conventions dealing with illicit drugs, played a
major part in the development of illicit drugs laws and policies in
Australia. They continue to be important, with proposals for drug
law reform being assessed in terms of international treaty
obligations.(64)
The use of and trade in cannabis and opium were, for many years,
common in the colonies of the Great Powers and a source of income
for countries such as Great Britain. However, in the early decades
of the 20th century, the United States emerged as the leading
exponent of a prohibitionist approach to the non-medical use of
drugs:
...the passage of the Harrison Act
(1914)-which effectively prohibited non-medical drug use in the
United States-was itself merely a means of garnering credibility to
advance the global suppression of recreational opiate use and,
concomitantly, to improve its foreign relations and trade with
China, which had been seeking to stop Britain's opium trade with it
for the best part of a century.(65)
In 1909 a meeting on the opium trade, spurred by the existence
of an opium trade between Great Britain and China, was held in
Shanghai and attended by 13 nations. This meeting did not produce
an international treaty but laid the groundwork for the 1912 Hague
Conference which was attended by 42 nations. The Hague Conference
produced the Hague Convention for the Suppression of Opium and
Other Drugs which exhorted its signatories to 'confine to medical
and legitimate purposes the manufacture, sale and use of opium,
heroin, morphine and cocaine'.(66) The United States was
unsuccessful in its attempts to have cannabis included in the 1912
Convention.
The 1925 Geneva Convention on Opium and Other Drugs restricted
to medical and scientific purposes the manufacture, importation,
sale, distribution, exportation and use of cannabis, as well as
medicinal opium, cocaine, morphine and heroin. Importantly, States
Parties were required to enact domestic laws to reflect these
requirements. The Geneva Convention also established the Permanent
Central Opium Board (PCOB) to collect statistics on narcotics use
from and to provide information on the import requirements of
States Parties. In 1931, the Narcotics Limitation Convention
targeted the manufacture of narcotics and required States Parties
to participate in an enforceable scheme whereby advance estimates
of requirements for narcotic drugs had to be notified by States
Parties to the PCOB. States Parties could only import and export
narcotics in conformity with those advance estimates.
The Commonwealth responded to international pressures as early
as 1914 when it restricted the importation of opium, morphine,
heroin and cocaine to medicinal purposes and required importers to
obtain a licence. It also applied pressure on the States to conform
with international drug treaties.
Regulation of the use, sale, possession or manufacture of
previously uncontrolled drugs such as morphine, heroin, cocaine and
medicinal opium was introduced at State level between 1913 and
about 1930. The possession of these drugs became legal only if
obtained on a medical prescription or if the possessor was a
specially authorised person such as a doctor or chemist. A system
of licences, record keeping requirements and authorisations was
established and penalties were introduced for unauthorised
possession.
There was some medicinal use of cannabis in Australia in the
19th century and cannabis cigarettes were available into the 20th
century. These things apart, cannabis was little used until the
1960s-which may account for the fact that in Australia the
regulation of cannabis was slower to materialise than the
regulation of morphine, heroin, cocaine and opium. The Commonwealth
prohibited the importation of cannabis in 1926. The first penal
controls in the States on unauthorised cannabis use were introduced
in Victoria with the Poisons Act 1927. Other States
followed: South Australia in 1934,(67) New South Wales in 1935,(68)
Queensland in 1937,(69) Western Australia in 1950(70) and Tasmania
in 1959.(71)
The medical use of heroin was phased out in Australia as the
20th century progressed, in response to international conventions
and pressure particularly from the United States. In 1949, the PCOB
criticised increased heroin use in Finland, Italy, Sweden, New
Zealand and Australia. At the time, heroin was used in Australia in
cough mixtures and for palliation in childbirth and terminal
cancer. The issue was raised again by the PCOB and the United
Nations in the early 1950s. In 1953 the Commonwealth Government
introduced an absolute prohibition on the importation of heroin and
urged the States to prohibit its manufacture. This they did-despite
opposition from the medical profession.(72)
The 1960s and 1970s
Recreational and dependent use of illicit drugs grew in the
1960s and 1970s in Australia and other Western nations.
Internationally, there was renewed interest in illicit drug
treaties. Domestically, penalties for illicit drug use were
increased. However, during the 1970s, legislators and policy makers
turned their attention to how best to respond to the drug problem
and began to ask whether the criminal law was the most appropriate
response to personal use and cultivation of cannabis, spawning a
number of State and Federal inquiries. In the mid to late 1970s,
the first reforms of cannabis laws occurred in the ACT and the
Northern Territory.
Until the 1960s, drug dependence was not viewed as a major
social problem in Australia. Dependent users whose addiction was
therapeutically induced were maintained on heroin, pethidine,
morphine and opium. However, in the 1960s and 1970s there was
increased and visible use of drugs like cannabis, heroin, and LSD.
The use of illicit drugs by the youth of Australia and other
Western nations provoked fears of social unrest and moral decay. In
addition, there was disquiet about the costs-societal and
personal-which stemmed from the impact of criminal laws on drug
users.(73)
From the 1960s, most Australian States gradually removed
controls on the non-medical use of drugs from poisons legislation
to statutes with a criminal justice orientation. Penalties were
increased, with the heaviest penalties prescribed for drug
traffickers. New drugs were added to prohibited drugs statutes-for
example, new offences were created of being in possession of,
manufacturing, selling, dealing or trafficking in hallucinogens,
and new powers were given to law enforcement officials.
The United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs 1961
consolidated a number of earlier narcotic drugs treaties. It
required the parties 'to limit exclusively to medical and
scientific purposes the production, manufacture, export, import,
distribution of, trade in, use and possession of [narcotic]
drugs'.(74) It was ratified by Australia in 1967. The Commonwealth
then enacted the Narcotic Drugs Act 1967 which establishes
a system of licensing and permits for the manufacture and
distribution of drugs covered by the Single Convention in order to
monitor domestic drug movements. These licences and permits are
additional to any required under State law.
The Commonwealth also revised offences and penalties relating to
narcotic drugs under the Customs Act 1901. In 1967, the
penalty for the unlawful importation of narcotics was increased
from a maximum of $1,000 or two years imprisonment to $4,000 or 10
years imprisonment. As well, a new offence of being in possession
of a narcotic without reasonable excuse on a ship or plane was
created, with the onus of proof being reversed and placed on the
defendant. Other offences introduced were importing or attempting
to import narcotics or being in possession of unlawfully imported
narcotics.
The Psychotropic Substances Act 1976 (Cwlth) was
enacted in response to the United Nations Convention on
Psychotropic Substances 1971 and provides for controls over certain
psychotropic substances entering Australian ports or airports in
the course of consignment from one country outside Australia to
another country outside Australia.(75) In 1977, section 229A was
added to the Customs Act 1901 (Cwlth), providing for
forfeiture of the proceeds of drug trafficking. In 1979, the
penalties for narcotic drugs offences were again amended in the
Customs Act. For example, the penalty for a Customs Act offence
involving a commercial quantity of any narcotic good (including
cannabis) was increased to life imprisonment.(76) In addition,
amendments to the Act inserted provisions for the recovery of
pecuniary penalties for dealings in narcotic goods. These
amendments enabled the Federal Court in civil proceedings to order
that a person pay a pecuniary penalty equivalent to the benefit
that person received from illegal drug trafficking and to enable
that person's assets to be frozen during those proceedings so that
they could not be disposed of.(77)
There were similar developments at State level: in general,
penalties were increased with differences in penalties between
'users' and 'traffickers.' For example, Victoria amended its
Poisons Act in 1976 to increase the maximum penalty for selling or
trafficking in narcotics or cannabis resin to $100,000 or 15 years
imprisonment. However, where cannabis below a certain strength was
involved the maximum penalty was $4,000 or 10 years imprisonment.
Simple possession of cannabis, however, continued to attract a fine
of $500 or one year in jail.(78)
Increases in the use of illicit drugs prompted a number of
Commonwealth and State inquiries: in particular by the Senate
Select Committee on Drug Trafficking and Drug Abuse,(79) the Senate
Standing Committee on Social Welfare,(80) the New South Wales Joint
Parliamentary Committee upon Drugs,(81) the Australian Royal
Commission of Inquiry into Drugs,(82) and the South Australian
Royal Commission into the Non-Medical Use of Drugs.(83)
With the exception of the Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry
into Drugs, the conclusions in relation to cannabis reached by
these inquiries were similar. In general, they distinguished
between the harm caused by cannabis and harm resulting from the use
of narcotics such as heroin and supported the decriminalisation of
personal use of cannabis.
The Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs
recommended against decriminalisation. It concluded that such a
step would be contrary to the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs
and lead to calls for decriminalisation of other illicit drugs. It
recommended that consideration of decriminalisation of cannabis use
be delayed for ten years during which time information on the drug
should be collected and analysed.
Lastly, some reform of personal cannabis use offences was
undertaken. For example, in 1975 amendments to the ACT's Public
Health (Prohibited Drugs) Ordinance reduced the maximum
penalty for possession of less than 25 grams of cannabis to $100.
In the Northern Territory, the Prohibited Drugs Ordinance
1977 set the maximum penalty for a first offence of cannabis
use or possession at $500.
The 1980s
The 1980s was a period of some reform of drug laws in Australia
and the establishment of the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse
(NCADA). With the emergence of the HIV/AIDS epidemic a greater
emphasis was gradually placed on harm reduction rather than on a
strictly prohibitionist approach to the non-medical use of drugs.
However, distinctions continued to be made not only between 'soft'
and 'hard' drugs but also between personal use and trafficking in
drugs, with the Commonwealth and States increasing penalties for
trafficking in illicit drugs, including cannabis.
The efficacy of prohibition to combat the drug problem continued
to be questioned in some quarters. The major inquiry on
drug-related issues held during the 1980s was conducted by the
Parliamentary Joint Committee on the National Crime Authority,
which published Drugs, Crime and Society in 1989. The
report stated:
If the aim of the policy [of
prohibition] was to reduce the use of prohibited substances, or
even to minimise access to them, it has clearly failed.(84)
However, international treaties continued to emphasise
prohibition and law enforcement. The United Nations Convention
Against Illicit Trafficking in Narcotics and Psychotropic
Substances 1988 is designed to suppress organised commercial
trafficking in narcotics and psychotropic substances at an
international level through the co-operative use of the criminal
law-including search, seizure and extradition.
NCADA emerged from the Special Premiers' Conference on Drugs
held in April 1985. The Conference developed a national strategy to
reduce the harm caused by drug abuse. NCADA's direction being
determined by the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy-a body
comprising Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers.
In 1986, the South Australian Parliament amended the
Controlled Substances Act 1984 to decriminalise the
cultivation and use of cannabis in small quantities. An expiation
notice scheme was established for adult offenders. If the fine
payable under the expiation notice is paid then no conviction is
recorded.(85) Payment is not regarded as an admission of guilt.
Juveniles who are found possessing, using or cultivating small
quantities of cannabis are dealt with in the Children's Court.
Law reform in relation to personal use and cultivation of
cannabis was largely confined to South Australia in this period.
New drug laws were introduced in Victoria, Queensland and New South
Wales during the 1980s.(86) In all these jurisdictions, simple
possession or cultivation of cannabis remained a criminal offence
potentially attracting heavy penalties, although in some cases
these were reduced from the penalty levels of earlier legislation.
Possession of drugs such as heroin, or trafficking in any
proscribed substance, carried even more severe sanctions. State
legislation also targeted drug trafficking in other ways: for
example, through forfeiture provisions, deeming provisions(87) and,
in some cases, provisions relating to the use of listening devices,
body searches and the issuing of search warrants.
Under the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985 (NSW),
the penalty for commercial trafficking in cannabis was set at
$500,000 and/or 20 years imprisonment while the penalty for
commercial trafficking in other illicit drugs was life
imprisonment. Under the Drugs Misuse Act 1986 (Qld),
possession of heroin or cocaine carried a maximum penalty of life
imprisonment or a fine of $500,000, or both. In South Australia,
when the Controlled Substances Act 1984 was amended in
1986 to provide for expiation notices, the penalties for
manufacturing, selling or supplying proscribed drugs, including
cannabis, were substantially increased.
The 1990s and Beyond
The 1990s has witnessed some further reform of cannabis laws,
reforms to drug paraphernalia laws(88) and discussion of
alternative approaches to 'hard' drugs such as heroin. However, for
the most part, Australian drug laws retain their criminal justice
orientation; heavy penalties for traffickers in all illicit drugs,
heavy penalties for users of 'hard' drugs and (with some
variations) heavy penalties for cannabis users.
In 1990, Australia ratified the United Nations Convention on
Illicit Trafficking in Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances. The
purpose of the Crimes (Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and
Psychotropic Substances) Act 1990 (Cwlth) is to give effect to
the terms of the Convention.
By the early 1990s, South Australia, Tasmania, Queensland and
New South Wales had repealed laws which made possession of needles
and syringes for the purpose of administering a prohibited drug a
criminal offence.(89) Reviews of cannabis laws were conducted by
the ACT Legislative Assembly Select Committee on HIV, Illegal Drugs
and Prostitution and the Queensland Criminal Justice
Commission.
In its 1991 report entitled Marijuana and Other Illegal
Drugs the ACT Select Committee recommended that:
- possession of up to 25 grams of cannabis no longer be an
offence;
- possession of between 25 grams and 100 grams cannabis should
attract a fine of $150;
- cultivation of up to five cannabis plants should no longer be
an offence; and
- self-administration of cannabis should no longer be an
offence.
The ACT Legislative Assembly did not adopt all of the
Committee's recommendations. Instead, the Drugs of Dependence
(Amendment) Act 1992 created simple cannabis offences for both
adults and juveniles. A simple cannabis offence results in an
offence notice for $100 which, if paid within 60 days, means that
the offence is discharged and no conviction is recorded. Simple
cannabis offences are those involving:
- cultivation of five or fewer cannabis plants;
- possession of not more than 25 grams of cannabis.
The Queensland report arose out of the Fitzgerald Royal
Commission, which recommended that the Criminal Justice Commission
(CJC) undertake a review of the criminal law, including illicit
drug laws. The CJC's report on Cannabis and the Law in
Queensland was published in 1994 and recommended a number of
statutory reforms including:
- the creation of simple offences of cannabis possession and
cultivation (a simple offence would be one of possession of 100
grams or less of cannabis or 20 grams or less of cannabis resin, or
one where not more than 10 cannabis plants were cultivated. The CJC
recommended that the maximum penalty for a simple possession
offence should be six months imprisonment or a fine of $1,500 or
both, and that the maximum penalty for a simple cultivation offence
should be two years imprisonment or a $6,000 fine or both);
- provisions that would enable a court not to record a conviction
against an offender and to fine a person guilty of a simple
cannabis offence no more than $500 in certain circumstances;
and
- abolition of offences of possession or use of cannabis
paraphernalia.(90)
While penalties vary between jurisdictions, maximum penalties
for simple cannabis offences remain high in some States. In New
South Wales, the maximum penalty for possession of cannabis leaf is
two years imprisonment or a $2,000 fine, or both.(91) In Western
Australia, under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1981, the lowest
range of penalties for simple drug offences (involving being at
premises where drugs are being smoked, possessing or using
prohibited drugs or possessing or cultivating prohibited plants) is
a maximum fine of $2,000 or imprisonment for 2 years or both.(92)
In Queensland, the maximum penalty for possession of less than 500
grams of cannabis is 15 years imprisonment and/or a $300,000 fine
if dealt with on indictment, or 2 years imprisonment and/or a
$6,000 fine if dealt with summarily.(93) In Tasmania, the
possession of cannabis attracts a maximum penalty of $5,000 or 2
years imprisonment or both(94) and cannabis law reform such as has
occurred in South Australia, the ACT or the Northern Territory is
probably unlikely. As the Australian Bureau of Criminal
Intelligence remarked:
Decriminalisation would have a
significant negative impact on Tasmania as it may result in the
loss of the entire opium poppy industry in the State. Tasmania is
licensed by the United Nations ... the continuation of this licence
is partly subject to the adherence of strict drug laws.(95)
National Task Force on Cannabis
In April 1992, the National Drug Strategy Committee(96) convened
a National Task Force on Cannabis to produce papers summarising the
current state of knowledge about the drug. 'While the Task Force
was not given the role of developing a national policy on cannabis,
it was thought that the review papers prepared for the Task Force
could contribute to the development of such a policy, by providing
a sound scientific knowledge base.'(97)
The Task Force commissioned papers on the health and
psychological effects of cannabis use, legislative options for
cannabis use, cannabis consumption patterns and public opinion.
Following consideration of these reports, the Task Force produced a
number of recommendations. In particular, it recommended that the
possession, unsanctioned cultivation, sale and non-therapeutic use
of cannabis in any quantity should remain illegal, but that
'jurisdictions consider discontinuing the application of criminal
penalties for the simple personal use or possession of cannabis,
without compromising activities aimed at deterring cannabis
use.'(98) The Task Force also recommended that an analysis be
conducted of the cannabis notice schemes in operation in South
Australia and the Australian Capital Territory.
Feasibility Research into the Controlled Availability of
Heroin
Heroin has also come under the spotlight with the presentation
of two reports from Feasibility Research into the Controlled
Availability of Opioids conducted by the National Centre for
Epidemiology and Population Health and the Australian Institute of
Criminology. An 'in principle' feasibility study of the provision
of heroin to dependent users was published in 1991. It recommended
that the study proceed to Stage 2, an examination of the logistical
feasibility of such a trial. The Stage 2 report, presented to the
ACT Chief Minister in 1995, recommended three pilot studies to
assess the usefulness of heroin as a maintenance treatment for
dependent heroin users. Progression to each pilot would depend on
the success of the previous pilot study. It was recommended
that:
- the first pilot should be conducted over a six month period and
involve 40 heroin dependent users resident in the ACT who have had
experience in methadone treatment programs;
- a second pilot should be conducted over a six month period and
involve 250 dependent heroin users resident in the ACT who have had
experience with methadone treatment;
- a third pilot study should be conducted over a 2 year period
and involve 1,000 dependent heroin users in three Australian
cities.
Following the presentation of the report, the ACT Chief Minister
commissioned a task force headed by former New South Wales coroner,
Kevin Waller, to examine community attitudes to a heroin trial and
the conduct of a trial, and to recommend whether the ACT Government
should proceed to the first pilot study. In January 1996, Mr
Waller's report was published. The Task Force recommended that:
- the ACT Government should proceed to a clinical trial to test
the efficacy of heroin prescription as an additional maintenance
treatment option; and
- a Steering Committee should be established to oversee the
preparation, operation and evaluation of Pilot 1.(99)
In January 1996, the then Minister for Justice, Duncan Kerr,
issued a press release on the report of the Heroin Pilot Task
Force. He said, 'I am yet to read the full report but I believe the
Task Force findings are important. From a law enforcement
perspective there are strong reasons for supporting the ACT heroin
trial.'(100) Mr Kerr said he would raise the issue at the next
meeting of the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy.
As a result of the Federal election on 2 March 1996, there was a
change of Government in Canberra. On 9 April 1996, the Commonwealth
Minister for Health, Michael Wooldridge, was reported as saying
that he was not optimistic about the prospects for the heroin
trial.(101) A meeting of the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy
considered but did not endorse the heroin trial proposal in
mid-1996. However, it decided that further consideration be given a
number of matters including the national implications of a trial. A
sub-committee of the National Drug Strategy Committee is
considering these matters. It is likely that a report will be made
to the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy in July 1997.
South Australian Select Committee on the Control and Illegal
Use of Drugs of Dependence
The South Australian Legislative Council established a Select
Committee to report on drugs of dependence in 1991. Among the
Committee's terms of reference were the extent and nature of
illicit drug use, the effectiveness and cost to the community of
drug trafficking laws, and the impact of criminal activity
associated with substance abuse and drug trafficking.
Among the recommendations made in the Committee's 1995 report
were that:
- where a person does not pay a cannabis expiation notice, no
criminal conviction should be recorded;
- cannabis paraphernalia laws should be repealed;
- South Australia should enact laws to regulate the cultivation
and sale of cannabis, in order to combat black market and criminal
activity associated with the distribution and sale of
cannabis;(102)
- the Commonwealth and State Governments should support the ACT's
proposed heroin trial;
- harm reduction approaches, including the provision of needle
exchange programs and methadone treatment, should be introduced in
South Australian prisons;
- the South Australian Police Statistical Services Unit should
collect data relating to the cost of police drug detection and
prevention activities and the level of crime related to illicit
drugs.(103)
It must be added that not all of the Committee's recommendations
were unanimous. In particular, dissenting statements were made in
relation to recommendations about the cannabis expiation notice
scheme, cannabis paraphernalia laws, and a regulated availability
model for cannabis in South Australia.
Western Australian Task Force on Drug Abuse
In 1995 the Western Australian Government's Task Force on Drug
Abuse published its report Protecting the Community. In
informing itself, the Task Force held 16 public hearings,
established a telephone hotline and invited written submissions. In
addition, it conducted community consultations with individuals and
groups having particular perspectives on drug abuse-including
families who had experienced drug abuse, high school students,
prisoners and young drug users receiving treatment. It collected
data on expenditure from government and non-government agencies and
specialist research organisations, consulted with government and
non-government agencies, conducted literature reviews and visited
other States and Territories for meetings and briefings.(104)
The Task Force's report is wide-ranging and includes an
examination of illicit drugs, legal drugs, pharmaceutical products,
solvents and performance enhancing drugs. It concluded that there
should be a ten-point program to fight drug abuse in Western
Australia and that this framework should encompass policy, law
enforcement, services,(105) education,(106) community
participation,(107) alcohol abuse reduction programs, specific
issue initiatives, information and research, co-ordination and
structure, and implementation strategies.(108) In relation to law
enforcement the report concluded, amongst other things, that:
[There should be] A major emphasis on
law enforcement, with increased powers for police and a focus on
high-level traffickers.
Law enforcement should be underpinned by clear and unequivocal
opposition to all forms of illicit drug use.
Following consideration of the evidence, there should be no
legalisation or decriminalisation of cannabis use or other
currently illicit drugs.
Increased powers should be provided to bring the Western
Australian police force into line with commonly accepted practice
in other Australian States, namely:
- telephone interception;
- listening devices;
- power to supply precursor chemicals and prohibited drugs;
- capacity for disposal and destruction of prohibited drugs;
- special penalties for possession of firearms while involved in
drug trafficking; and
- support for resourcing of major drug investigations.(109)
Report of the Victorian Premier's Drug Advisory Council
In December 1995 the Victorian Premier, Jeff Kennett,
established the Premier's Drug Advisory Council headed by Professor
David Pennington.(110) The Council inquired into illicit drugs and
how to tackle the illicit drug trade.
The motivation for establishing the Council appears to have been
the number of heroin-related deaths in Victoria during 1995 and
reported increases in heroin trafficking in the State. The
Victorian Coroner reportedly attributed 140 deaths in the State in
1995 to heroin-related causes, compared with 84 in 1994 and 59 in
1993.(111) Other deaths, said to be associated with an influx of
high-grade heroin into Australia, were reported in other
jurisdictions such as the ACT.(112)
The Council's report was published on 10 April 1996. Its
recommendations were unanimous and it took the view that: 'we
should [not] lessen efforts to control trafficking, but rather that
we should look afresh at strategies that might curb demand and
reduce the harm caused in society by the use of illicit
drugs.'(113)
It is not possible to detail all the Council's many
recommendations. It proposed the implementation of an integrated
information and education strategy dealing with both licit and
illicit drugs, and that treatment and support services be expanded,
especially for young people and for adult offenders. It supported
severe penalties for drug trafficking. It also recommended
that:
- use and possession of small amounts of marijuana (25 grams or
less) should no longer be an offence;
- cultivation of up to five cannabis plants per household for
personal use should no longer be an offence;
- sale of marijuana should remain an offence;
- recorded convictions for the possession and use of small
amounts of marijuana should be expunged from a person's criminal
record;
- use and possession of heroin, cocaine, amphetamines, ecstasy
and cannabis products other than marijuana should remain a an
offence. However, the penalty for a first offence should be a
caution and referral to a treatment service and the preferred
penalty for a second offence should be an adjourned bond; and
- penalties for bond breaches or subsequent drug use offences
should include the use of escalating penalties. However, the
Council recommended that imprisonment should be used as a 'last
resort penalty'.(114)
In the context of these proposals for legislative reform, the
Council stressed that amendments must take account of Australia's
international treaty obligations and recommended that legal advice
should be obtained by the Victorian Government on the subject of
legislative reform.
The Council also recommended that the Victorian Government
should 'encourage the Commonwealth to support the Australian
Capital Territory heroin pilot study and, if appropriate, the
subsequent clinical trial of heroin prescribing.'(115)
On 8 January 1997, the Victorian Government announced its
response to the Pennington inquiry. The response includes
legislating for heavier sentences for drug traffickers,
manufacturers and importers and the option of lighter sentences for
drug users in certain circumstances. Legislative amendments are
expected to be implemented by mid-1997. The Government is also
proposing to finance a range of educational programs aimed at
providing information on the effects of drug use. At the same time,
the Government rejected a clinical heroin trial in Victoria.
Instead, it has reportedly earmarked about $2 million for a
feasibility study of alternative drug therapies. It is planned that
about 200 dependent heroin users will participate in a study that
assesses the usefulness of slow release oral morphine, L-alpha
acetyl methadol (LAAM), buprenorphine and naltrexone.(116)
Northern Territory Misuse of Drugs Amendment Act 1996
On 28 February 1996, the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly
passed the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Act 1996. The Act
commenced on 1 July 1996. The amendment provides police with the
discretion to issue an infringement notice to (rather than
prosecute) an adult who is in possession of less than 50 grams of
cannabis, less than 1 gram of cannabis oil, 10 grams of cannabis
resin or cannabis seed or who is cultivating two or fewer cannabis
plants. The infringement notice penalty is set at $200. If paid
within the set period, the offence is expiated. In his Second
Reading Speech on the amendments, the Northern Territory
Attorney-General, Steve Hatton, said:
The personal possession of even the
smallest amount of cannabis will remain an offence under Northern
Territory law, and police will retain the discretion to prosecute
the possession of cannabis through the courts. However, the
government is prepared to face the reality that the possession and
use of cannabis is widespread in the community, regardless of the
penalties that have been imposed in relation to its use... The
government's view is that, in the situation where no other person
is being harmed as a result of the conduct of the offender, a
criminal conviction for such behaviour is disproportionate. It is
the government's view that it is a waste of police resources to
insist on the prosecution of adult offenders before the
courts.(117)
Since the early decades of the 20th century, penalties for users
and dealers in illicit drugs have increased, law enforcement
strategies have become more sophisticated and the number of mind
altering substances caught by illicit drug laws has expanded.
Whether these policies have reduced drug use or the amount of drug
related harm in Australia continues to be debated.
The consequences of a prohibitionist approach to the non-medical
use of drugs have been examined by many writers and in many
inquiries. In 1989, the Parliamentary Joint Committee on the
National Crime Authority listed the social costs of prohibition as
including the direct costs of law enforcement, drug-related crime,
the involvement of professional criminals and organised crime,
corruption in law enforcement bodies, health costs, the
stigmatisation of drug users, the erosion of civil liberties in the
name of the war against drugs and the benefits foregone by the
community because illicit drugs like heroin and cannabis are not
available for medical use.
Those who support drug law reform may argue from these bases
that reform will minimise or, in some cases, remove these costs.
One way of assessing these claims may be through evaluation of drug
law reforms and controlled treatment trials. An evaluation of the
cannabis expiation notice scheme in South Australia undertaken by
the South Australian Office of Crime Statistics was published in
1989. The authors concluded that the expiation notice scheme in
South Australia was not accompanied, at least until 1988, by
changes in 'the rate of detection of simple cannabis offences or in
the type of people detected possessing or using cannabis.'(118) The
authors found that the expiation notice system had not had a 'net
widening' effect, as feared by some of its critics. However, more
recent research into the South Australian scheme suggests that:
- although cannabis use rates have increased only slightly in
South Australia, there has been a substantial increase in the
number of cannabis offences detected by the South Australian police
since the expiation notice scheme was introduced;
- a proportion of minor cannabis offences involve offenders under
the age of 18 years or are minor cannabis offences which occur in
public, and so cannot be dealt with under the expiation scheme in
South Australia;
- there has been a decline in the number of minor cannabis
offences which are expiated-in other words, offenders fail to pay
the fine, are prosecuted and may be convicted of a criminal
offence.
It may be that the social and individual harms associated with
criminal conviction have not been overcome by the expiation notice
system in South Australia and that the scheme may impact most
heavily on those with low incomes and the unemployed. If this is
the case, then further changes to the law may be indicated.
Further evaluation of the South Australian expiation notice
scheme is under way, including an economic analysis of the scheme
and studies of community attitudes and the attitudes of the
judiciary and police. Importantly, too, this research will compare
the South Australian (decriminalised) and Western Australian
(prohibitionist) approaches to simple cannabis offences. Such
research has great potential to inform Australian legislators,
policy makers and the community. Overseas, trials of controlled
provision of heroin to dependent users have been undertaken in
Switzerland,(119) with a final report on the Swiss trial expected
in July 1997. While the ACT's proposed heroin trial awaits further
consideration by the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy, the
Victorian Government plans to fund research into other treatment
strategies for dependent heroin users.
If drug law reform proposals are to be implemented in Australia,
then their efficacy should be rigorously and independently assessed
to determine if they are working and whether and how they should be
changed. Pilot programs such as that proposed by the Victorian
Government may also produce useful results for the development of
law and policy.
It is generally recognised that any approach to illicit and
legal drugs should be multi-faceted. There is, therefore, a role
for research and evaluation to help show what works not only in
terms of drug laws but in other approaches to illicit drugs, such
as education and treatment. While many drug law reformers are
critical about the prohibitionist approach to illicit drugs, it is
imperative that research and evaluation also inform the development
and implementation of law enforcement strategies. As two Australian
researchers have recently argued:
...drug law enforcement in some shape or another is here to
stay, whatever drug law reforms take place in the future, and it
behoves us to render such enforcement as rational as
possible.(120)
Amphetamines. Amphetamines are a class of drugs
that stimulate the central nervous system. Amphetamines are also
called 'speed.'
Depressants. Depressants are drugs that sedate
or lower nervous or functional activity in the body.
Hallucinogens. These are drugs that alter
sensory perception and cause hallucinations. Hallucinogens include
LSD.
MDA. 3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine-a common
variety of amphetamine.
MDEA. 3,4-methylenedioxyethylamphetamine. MDEA
is also known as 'Eve' and is a variety of amphetamine.
MDMA. 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine. Also
known as ecstasy. A derivative of amphetamine.
Narcolepsy. Sufferers of narcolepsy experience
periodic attacks of an uncontrollable urge to sleep during normal
waking hours.
Narcotics. A narcotic is a drug which
suppresses the central nervous system and relieves pain. Narcotics
include opium, morphine, codeine and heroin.
PMA. Paramethoxyamphetamine. This is also a
variety of amphetamine.
Psychoactive drugs. These are drugs which alter
mood, cognition or behaviour.
Synaesthesia. Synaesthesia is a sensation
produced in one physical sense when a stimulus is applied to
another physical sense, as when the hearing of a certain sound
induces the visualisation of a certain colour.
Stimulants. Stimulants are drugs that speed up
the functioning of the central nervous system. Stimulants include
caffeine, nicotine, amphetamines and cocaine.
THC. THC or delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol is the
psychoactive ingredient in cannabis.
- This paper uses the terms licit and illicit as legal
categorisations and does not draw conclusions about the relative
harms, dangerousness or usefulness of licit or illicit drugs.
- Manderson, D. 'Trends and influences in the history of
Australian drug legislation', The Journal of Drug Issues,
22(3), Summer, 1992: 507-20.
- National Drug Strategy, Household Survey. Survey Report
1995, AGPS, Canberra, 1996: 7.
- The Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy is responsible for
overseeing the National Drug Strategy. Its members are
Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers responsible for health
and the police. The Commonwealth is represented by the
Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, and by the Minister for
Health and Family Services.
- Examples of relevant Commonwealth laws include the Customs
Act 1901, the Proceeds of Crime Act 1987, the
Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act 1987, the
Narcotic Drugs Act 1967, and the Crimes (Traffic in
Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances) Act 1990.
- Quoted in S. Henry-Edwards & R. Pols, Responses to Drug
Problems in Australia (National Campaign Against Drug Abuse
Monograph Series No. 16), AGPS, Canberra, 1991: 2.
- Note that the increase has been from 5 per cent in 1985 to 15
per cent in 1993.
- I. McAllister, Knowledge, Attitudes and Policy Preferences
Concerning Drugs, AGPS, Canberra, 1993; National Drug Strategy
1995, op.cit.
- D. Redwood, Anabolic Steroids: A Growing Community
Concern (Current Issues Brief No. 45 1994-95), Canberra,
Parliamentary Research Service, 1995.
- J. Jiggens, 'A potted history' in The Good Weekend
Magazine, 2 March 1996.
- Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence, Australian
Illicit Drug Report 1995-96, Canberra, December 1996.
- Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence, Australian
Illicit Drug Report 1994, Canberra, April 1995.
- Trial cultivation has occurred or is planned in South
Australia, NSW, Victoria and Tasmania. See ABCI 1995-96,
op.cit.
- W. Hall, N. Solowij & J. Lemon, The Health and
Psychological Consequences of Cannabis Use (National Drug
Strategy Monograph Series No. 25), AGPS, Canberra, 1994.
- Quoted in ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.
- F. Zackon, 'Heroin: The Street Narcotic', The Encyclopedia
of Psychoactive Drugs, Burke Publishing Company Limited,
London, 1986: 59.
- See ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.
- Premier's Drug Advisory Council, Drugs and Our
Community, March 1996.
- National Committee on Violence, Violence. Directions for
Australia, Australian Institute of Criminology, Canberra,
1990.
- ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.
- ibid.
- J.A. Inciardi, The War on Drugs. Heroin, Cocaine, Crime and
Public Policy, Mayfield Publishing Company, Palo Alto, 1986:
81.
- T. Chadwick & J. Jolly, Stimulants: Amphetamine,
Ecstasy, Cocaine, Speed, Crack, Caffeine, Release
Publications, London, 1990.
- ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.
- Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence, Australian
Illicit Drug Report 1994: 46.
- ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.: 230.
- J. Bowman & R. Sanson-Fisher, Public Perceptions of
Cannabis Legislation, (National Drug Strategy Monograph Series
No. 28), AGPS, Canberra, 1994.
- N. Donnelly & W. Hall, Patterns of Cannabis Use in
Australia (National Drug Strategy Monograph No. 27), AGPS,
Canberra, 1994.
- National Drug Strategy 1995, op.cit.
- W. Hall & J. Nelson, Public Perceptions of the Health
and Psychological Consequences of Cannabis Use (National Drug
Strategy Monograph Series No. 29), AGPS, Canberra, 1995.
- Bowman & Sanson-Fisher, op.cit; National Drug Strategy
1995, op.cit.
- T. Makkai, Patterns of drug use: Australia and the United
States, AGPS, Canberra, 1994. Note that the survey did not
distinguish between use of cocaine and crack.
- National Drug Strategy 1995, op.cit.
- ibid.
- Referred to in S. Lenton & A. Tan-Quigley, The fitpack
study. a survey of 'hidden' drug injectors with minimal drug
treatment experience, NCRPDA, Curtin University of Technology,
January 1997.
- ibid.
- Department of Human Services and Health, Statistics on drug
abuse in Australia 1994, AGPS, Canberra, 1994.
- W. Hall, 'Drugs, death and human misery: What have we learned
during the National Campaign about drug related morbidity and
mortality?' Conference Paper.
- L.G. Sullivan, 'Interpreting our drug statistics: holes in the
data on illegal drugs,' Medical Journal of Australia,
vol.161, 7 November 1994: 569-70.
- D.J. Collins, & H.M. Lapsley, Estimating the economic
costs of drug abuse in Australia (NCADA Monograph Series No.
15), AGPS, Canberra, 1991.
- R.E. Marks, 'What price prohibition? An estimate of the costs
of Australian drug policy,' Australian Journal of
Management, 16(2), December 1991: 187-212.
- The expression 'illicit drug abuse' is the phrase adopted by
the authors of the National Drug Strategy report.
- D.J. Collins, & H.M. Lapsley, The social costs of drug
abuse in Australia in 1988 and 1992 (National Drug Strategy
Monograph No. 30), AGPS, Canberra, 1996.
- D. McDonald & L. Atkinson (eds), Social impacts of the
legislative options for cannabis in Australia: Phase 1:
Research (Report to the National Drug Strategy Committee),
Australian Institute of Criminology, Canberra, April 1995.
- ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.
- R. Fox & I. Mathews, Drugs Policy. Fact, Fiction and
the Future, Federation Press, Sydney, 1992.
- National Committee on Violence, op.cit.: 90.
- T. Fitzgerald, Report of a Commission of Inquiry into
Illegal Activities & Associated Police Misconduct,
Government Printer, Queensland, 1989.
- Reported in ABCI 1995-95, op.cit.: 172.
- D. Hawks, & S. Lenton, 'Harm reduction in Australia: Has it
worked? A review,' Drug and Alcohol Review, 14, 1995:
291-304 at 298.
- I. McAllister, Knowledge, attitudes and policy preferences
concerning drugs in Australian society, AGPS, Canberra,
1993.
- Bowman & Sanson-Fisher, op.cit.
- National Drug Strategy, 1993 National Drug Household
Survey, AGPS, Canberra, 1993.
- National Drug Strategy 1995, op.cit.
- ibid.: 49.
- D. McDonald et al, Legislative options for cannabis in
Australia (National Drug Strategy Monograph Series No. 26),
AGPS, Canberra, 1994.
- Manderson, 'Trends and influences in the history of Australian
drug legislation,' op.cit.
- Parliamentary Joint Committee on the National Crime Authority,
Drugs, crime and society, AGPS, Canberra, 1989.
- D. Manderson, From Mr Sin to Mr Big: A history of
Australian drug laws, Oxford University Press, Melbourne,
1993.
- Report of the Royal Commission on Secret Drugs, Cures and
Foods, Parliamentary Papers Session 1907-1908.
- ibid.: 321.
- Manderson, From Mr Sin to Mr Big, op.cit. T. Carney,
'The history of Australian drug laws: Commercialism to confusion?'
Monash University Law Review, vol. 7, June, 1981:
165-204.
- Opium Act 1895 (SA), Aboriginals Protection and
Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897 (Qld), Opium
Smoking Prohibition Act 1905 (Vic), Police Offences
Amendment Act 1908 (NSW).
- For example, the Victorian Premier's Drug Advisory Council
recommended that expert legal advice should be obtained by the
Victorian Government 'to inform its decisions about legislative
reform.' Drugs and Our Community, March 1996: 131.
- Manderson, 'Trends and influences in the history of Australian
drug legislation', op.cit.: 512.
- Quoted in Manderson, From Mr Sin to Mr Big, op.cit.:
63.
- Dangerous Drugs Act 1934 (SA).
- Police Offences Amendment (Drugs) Act 1935 (NSW).
- Health Act 1937 (Qld).
- By a Proclamation made in 1950 under the Police Offences
(Drugs) Act 1928 (WA).
- Dangerous Drugs Act 1959 (Tas).
- Stockpiles of heroin in Victoria meant that it continued to be
used by the medical profession to treat patients during the 1950s
and 1960s.
- In South Australia, for example, between 1974 and 1977, the
number of people charged with drug-related offences increased from
107 to 756 and the number of persons convicted of drug-related
offences increased from 94 to 642.
- Cannabis and cocaine are classified as narcotics under the
Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs 1961.
- Second Reading Speech, Psychotropic Substances Bill 1976, House
of Representatives, Parliamentary Debates, 29 April 1976:
1763. Import and export controls on these substances are contained
in Commonwealth customs legislation and controls over manufacture,
distribution and use are provided for in State and Territory
laws.
- See section 235(2)©. The amounts of narcotic goods
involved in commercial and traffickable quantities are set out in
Schedule VI of the Customs Act 1901.
- Division 3, Part XIII.
- Carney, op.cit.
- Senate Select Committee on Drug Trafficking and Drug Abuse,
Report, Commonwealth Government Printing Office, Canberra,
1971.
- Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfare, Drug Problems
in Australia: An Intoxicated Society?, AGPS, Canberra,
1977.
- Joint Parliamentary Committee Upon Drugs, Report into Drug
Abuses, Sydney, 1978.
- Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs,
Report, AGPS, Canberra, 1980.
- Royal Commission into the Non-Medical Use of Drugs South
Australia, Final Report, Adelaide, April 1979.
- Parliamentary Joint Committee on the National Crime Authority,
op.cit.: 92.
- Fines applicable under the expiation notice scheme are as
follows:
- possession of less than 25 grams of cannabis-$50.00;
- possession of between 25 grams and less than 100 grams of
cannabis-$150.00;
- possession of less than 5 grams of cannabis resin-$50.00;
- possession of between 5 grams and less than 20 grams of
cannabis resin-$150.00
- cultivation of 10 or fewer cannabis plants-$150.00.
- These laws included the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled
Substances Act 1981 (Vic), the Drugs Misuse Act 1986
(Qld) and the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985
(NSW).
- For example, a person in possession of a traffickable quantity
of a prohibited or controlled drug is deemed to be trafficking in
that substance unless he or she proves otherwise.
- Drug paraphernalia includes such things as injecting
equipment.
- In Victoria, Western Australia, the Northern Territory and the
ACT possession of needles and syringes does not appear to have been
caught by offence provisions prohibiting the possession of needles
and syringes for use in the administration of illicit drugs.
- For example, a bong.
- Drugs Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985 (NSW), sections
10 & 21.
- See Western Australian Task Force on Drug Abuse,
Report, Chapter 3: Legislative Background.
- Drugs Misuse Act 1986 (Qld), sections 9 & 54.
- Poisons Act 1971 (Tas), section 49, as amended by the
Penalty Units and Other Penalties Amendment Act 1991
(Tas).
- ABCI 1995-96, op.cit.: 34.
- The National Drug Strategy Committee oversees the development
of the National Drug Strategy and complementary strategies in all
States and Territories.
- National Drug Strategy, Report of the National Task Force
on Cannabis, AGPS, Canberra, 1994: 1.
- ibid.: xii.
- Heroin Pilot Task Force, The report of the Heroin Pilot
Task Force, January 1996.
- Minister for Justice (Duncan Kerr), 'Federal Justice Minister
welcomes Heroin Task Force report', Press release, 11 January
1996.
- 'Setback for heroin trial', Canberra Times, 10 April
1996.
- Sale to minors and public use of cannabis would be banned under
this scheme, as would advertising and promotion of cannabis.
- Parliament of South Australia, Report of the Select
Committee on the Control and Illegal Use of Drugs of
Dependence, July 1995.
- Western Australian Task Force on Drug Abuse, Report,
Chapter 1.
- Recommended service initiatives and reforms included devolving
the services of the Drug and Alcohol Authority to the private
sector, the expansion of family services, youth treatment services
and methadone treatment programs, special initiatives directed to
intoxicated youth and solvent abusers, and more treatment services
for offenders.
- Recommendations included the introduction of drug education as
a compulsory part of the school curriculum; the development of
drugs policies by schools, a major public education program on
illicit drugs, providing special and general education programs for
Aboriginal people, and the development of parent education
programs.
- The report recommended that Regional Drug Coordinating Councils
should be established to involve the community in deciding local
strategies and initiatives, and proposed the establishment of a
Community Leaders Against Drug Abuse Program.
- The report contains recommendations about simplified structures
to coordinate drug issues activities at national, State and
regional level; and an implementation process for its
recommendations.
- ibid: 14-15 (Executive Summary),
http://www.wa.gov.au/cdco/taskforce/ExecSummary.html
- Professor Pennington was Vice Chancellor of the University of
Melbourne from 1988 to 1995, Chairman of the AIDS Task Force from
1983 to 1987 and Chief Advisor on Health Policy and Programs for
the Victorian Health Department from 1986 to 1987.
- 'Marijuana', Australian News Wire Service, 27 February
1995.
- 'Victoria faces a worsening drug problem', Canberra
Times, 4 December 1995
- Premier's Drug Advisory Council, op.cit.
- See recommendations 7.1-7.8.
- ibid.: 125.
- 'States new bid to help addicts,' Age, 22 February
1997.
- Attorney-General (Northern Territory) Second Reading Speech,
Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill 1996, Parliamentary Record, Seventh
Assembly, First Session, 29 November 1995: 6147-8.
- R. Sarre, 'The partial "decriminalisation" of cannabis: the
South Australian experience', Current Issues in Criminal
Justice, 6(2), November 1994: 196-207 at 207.
- See A. Uchtenhagen et al, Program for a medical
prescription of narcotics. Interim report of the research
representatives (2nd edn), Zurich, May 1996.
- A. Sutton & S. James, 'From evaluation to the future:
Australian drug law enforcement,' paper presented to the 7th
International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harm,
Hobart, 3-7 March 1996.
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