2016-10-27
My adjournment matter tonight is for the Minister for Mental Health, Martin Foley. This past week has been yet another tragic reminder of the impacts of recreational drug use on everyday Australians and their loved ones. Last weekend a young Victorian footballer died in hospital in Surfers Paradise after consuming the latest ‘party drug’ to hit our streets — a combination of MDMA and other amphetamine‑type substances known as the ‘N‑Bomb’. Another 21 young people needed hospitalisation or medical treatment from emergency services. I consider this to be a wake‑up call in relation to the so‑called ‘party drugs’ which claimed five lives in 2015.
As tens of thousands of students prepare for schoolies celebrations in just a few weeks, the timing of another deadly batch of recreational drugs could not be worse. The current ideologically‑driven preoccupation with taking a law and order rather than a harm reduction approach to party drugs is putting the lives of young Australians at risk and it is clearly not working.
The European Union has implemented pill testing trials which are detecting deadly substances in recreational drugs, warning potential consumers and saving lives. On‑site pill testing has been shown to reduce consumption of potentially unsafe drugs. Users overwhelmingly choose not to consume a drug if alerted to the risks related to its strength or contents. Early warning schemes have also proved effective, preventing the consumption of drugs that have caused deaths in other jurisdictions without similar monitoring schemes. Comprehensive monitoring of the drug market influences the nature of the market, as substitutes that are the subject of public campaigns disappear from the market within a very short time of these campaigns.
Demand for a comprehensive monitoring system in Victoria is high, particularly from the health sector, which argues that the information gathered would assist with diagnosis and treatment both in the field and in emergency rooms. We are coming into the summer season of many festivals across the state, and we urge the minister to agree to initiate a trial for pill testing at festivals in Victoria this summer. We believe that this will save young people’s lives.