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Helen Clark appointed to Global Commission on Drug Policy
Helen Clark will join other former heads of state on the prestigious Global Commission on Drug Policy. The former prime minister will be working alongside former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan, and prominent business people and cultural leaders such as Sir Richard Branson. […]
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ACT government ‘interested’ in Victorian supervised injecting rooms trial outcomes
The ACT government has ruled out an injecting room for the territory “at this time” but will be interested in the outcomes of a Victorian trial. “Notwithstanding this, we are committed to expanding access to evidence-informed drug harm minimisation measures, and will continue to monitor emerging evidence,” the spokesman said. […]
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U.N., Human Rights Bodies Call Welfare Drug Testing ‘Cheap Shot’ At The Poor
The government’s controversial plan to drug test welfare recipients is under fire yet again, with the United Nations’ rapporteur on human rights calling the policy a “cheap shot” that will “stigmatise” the country’s poorest and most vulnerable. Special rapporteur Philip Alston also queried why the government was targeting only the poor…
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Pill testing highlights conflict on drugs
While plans for an Australia-first trial of pill testing at next month’s Spilt Milk music festival in Canberra have been shelved, the idea is unlikely to go away. It is also clear that the old ‘just say no’ approach to drugs is, at best, not enough because there will always be those tempted…
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Australia’s first pill-testing trial cancelled – and ACT Liberals take credit
The Australian Capital Territory Liberal party has taken credit for blocking a pioneering pill-testing trial at an Australian music festival after organisers announced it will no longer go ahead. On Friday ACT Liberals congratulated the shadow attorney general, Jeremy Hanson, for “intervening” to block a pill-testing trial at the Spilt Milk…
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Spilt Milk pulls out of Australia’s first pill testing trial
Acting Minister for Health Shane Rattenbury told ABC Radio Canberra this morning he’d heard rumours and was concerned that pill testing wouldn’t go ahead.However, he said the Government had “made all the right steps”. “The ACT Government has approved pill testing and believes that’s it’s a valuable harm minimisation measure,” he…
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Richard Branson Advocates for Drug Decriminalization to Resolve the Opioid Crisis
Branson notes that it is “striking that in states that allow regulated use of medical marijuana, overdose death rates are lower. It confirms what my fellow Commissioners and I have been saying for years: that the most effective way to reduce the extensive harms of prohibition and advance the goals…
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Liberal MP Craig Kelly Wants Australia To Reconsider Its Drug Policy
Liberal MP Craig Kelly has said that Australia’s drug policies need to be reconsidered after it was revealed that in 2016 the nation recorded the highest number of drug-induced deaths in decades. Speaking to Perth’s 6PR radio station, the backbench MP from the Sydney seat of Hughes said that there were…
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ACT Government approves free pill testing at Spilt Milk festival
In a groundbreaking Australian-first, the ACT Government will allow free pill testing to take place at the Spilt Milk music festival in Canberra on November 25. […]
