• ACT legalises personal cannabis use, becoming first Australian jurisdiction to do so

    The ACT has become the first Australian jurisdiction to legalise the possession, use and cultivation of small amounts of cannabis. The laws passed the ACT Legislative Assembly this afternoon, allowing possession of up to 50 grams per person and a maximum of four plants per household. […]

  • Port Phillip Council renews pill testing trial call

    With the music festival season about to start, the City of Port Phillip is renewing its call to be home to Victoria’s first pill testing trial. “In 2017, our Council asked the Victorian Government to immediately legislate to allow and fund pilot pill testing facilities at ‘consenting clubs, festivals and dance parties in Port Phillip to minimise the harms associated…

  • ‘Young people will die without pill testing’: Victorian MP’s festival plea

    Ms Patten held a press conference on Monday, alongside young people who had experienced near-death incidents as a result of taking drugs, arguing lives lost from drug overdoses could have been saved with pill testing. “The government still hasn’t agreed to a pill testing trial, an initiative that we know can contribute to keeping young people safe and informed,” Ms…

  • Enough evidence to support introduction of pill testing in NSW, inquiry told

    A world expert on drug policy has told an inquiry into the drug ice and other amphetamines, including MDMA (ecstasy), that there is “sufficient evidence” overseas and in Australia to support the introduction of drug or pill testing in NSW. Professor Alison Ritter called for a trial of pill testing at festivals in evidence to the Special Commission of Inquiry…

  • Festivals fuel Vic pill testing appeal

    Victorian upper house MP Fiona Patten has issued an appeal for pill testing on the cusp of the music festival season, with the Listen Out event running in St Kilda this weekend. “We are crying out and calling on the government to prevent any lives from being lost,” the Reason Party leader told reporters on Monday. […]

  • Former Police Commissioner: Weaker Alternatives To Pill Testing Will Not Curb Festival Deaths

    Empowering people to make fully-informed decisions about drugs is a central tenetof proper pill testing. It puts young punters first. It provides them with the incentive to get their drugs tested before making the decision to consume them. This not only empowers them to make better decisions, it also reduces the likelihood of a potentially fatal event. […]

  • Pill testers working on plans for static drug-checking sites

    Canberra emergency department physician, Dr David Caldicott revealed the group was developing a proposal for a testing service at a fixed location. “We’re already working on static sites. I can’t tell you where, it’s top secret. But needless to say there are people in this room who are involved,” Dr Caldicott said. […]

  • He was the top cop in NSW and couldn’t help a friend in a drug crisis

    Former NSW police commissioner Andrew Scipione says the system of dealing with people using drugs isn’t working, and has supported measures that give police the discretion to issue cautions or infringement notices. He told a roundtable on decriminalisation of amphetamine-type substances that NSW had failed to stop people from experimenting with drugs and going on to have lives that are”…

  • Drug policy priorities ‘all wrong’, says minister as he slams ‘national disgrace’

    ACT Corrections and Justice Health Minister Shane Rattenbury has labelled the increasing number of people in Australian prisons “a national disgrace”, created in part by the treatment of drug use as a justice issue rather than a health one. He also said he would like to see the use of illicit drugs other than cannabis decriminalised. […]

  • Addiction specialists warn welfare drug testing will do more harm than good

    Addiction expert Dr Stephen Bright told The New Daily “it’s absolutely probable” that Newstart and Youth Allowance recipients using any of the five targeted drugs would move on other substances that are undetectable by the test. “The drugs people move to as a way of evading drug testing are often significantly more harmful than the drugs they’re testing for,” Dr Bright, senior lecturer at Edith Cowan…