Pubdate: Tue, 06 Mar 2007
Source: Daily Telegraph (Australia)
Copyright: 2007 News Limited
Contact:  http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/113
Author: Kelvin Bissett

IS THIS SYDNEY, OR AMSTERDAM?

SYDNEY is fast becoming a sunnier verion of doped-out, drug-riddled
Amsterdam. And we were never even asked about it.

When the then Carr Government passed its new drug caution scheme for
teenagers in 2000, the official spin was that it was about diverting
teens to treatment.

Based on a recommendation from the NSW Drug Summit, the amendments to
the Young Offenders Act were also said to help youths avoid a scarring
confrontation with the legal system. Fair enough.

But the people of NSW were never told that the changes amounted to
effective decriminalisation of personal possession of even nasties
like cocaine and narcotics.

Because that's what figures from the NSW Bureau of Crime and Research
suggest has evolved in the six years since.

The rate of cautions being issued – and number of charges going
to court – has plummeted.

Ecstasy has almost tripled since the early 1990s, and Australia is
said to have the highest rate of usage in the world.

But police could only find 17 teens with the illicit substance to
caution last year.

Ice use is rampant, destroying lives. Yet police issued just 15
cautions to young people last year for use and possession of
amphetamines.

While its true that cannabis is declining, the number of cautions for
use is also falling too.

The police clearly have heard the message from policy makers that
rigorous compliance and enforcement of the law for minor use of drugs
is not their priority.

Besides, the paperwork for a worthless caution is hardly worth the
effort, so why would officers bother?

So police are diverting resources elsewhere, choosing not to look
where they might find minor amounts of illicit substances that can
kill or lead to a years of excruciating enslavement.

The sad effect of this, as veteran campaigner Major Brian Watters
points out, is that vulnerable youngsters are missing out on the
helpful correction that can come from early intervention.

Drug law reform campaigners, who have long peddled their wares in the
backrooms at Macquarie St, have engineered another retreat in the war
on drugs.

It's their biggest win since the Medically Supervised Injecting
Room.

But the decent people of NSW never signed up for drug
decriminalisation – and this is what the caution system has become. 
- ---
MAP posted-by: Steve Heath