“Bestival strongly advises festival goers to avoid taking any illegal substances,” says a Bestival spokesperson in a statement. “However, harm reduction and customer welfare are our priorities, so we have made the decision to bring The Loop onboard to offer drug safety testing onsite, giving people the opportunity to make informed choices.” […]

Fans may want to think twice before attending ‘Above and Beyond’ music gig as police warn fans will be kicked out if a drug sniffer dog just sits next to them. They will be refused entry regardless of whether drugs are even found on them. Fans are slamming the police for harsh warning: ‘So presumed guilty even after being proven…

The decision has been slammed by politicians, drug safety advocates and civil libertarians who point to the questionable reliability of sniffer dogs and argue that police are abusing their powers. “Penalising people for the failure of the drug dog program is a clear abuse of police powers,” NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge said. […]

A new police policy around drugs, sniffer dogs and music festivals may be illegal and ”a clear abuse of police powers,” lawyers say. It’s a fundamentally flawed approach. Sniffer dogs are notoriously ineffective, producing false positives up to 80 percent of the time. By this logic, 4 in 5 people approached by dogs at the Above and Beyond — many of…

The evidence so far suggests that, far from encouraging drug-taking, testing services seem to make people think twice. The Loop reports that 10-15% of the drug users it deals with decide to ditch their stash on learning what is really in it (which has included everything from concrete to anti-malaria medicine). […]

Even though legalisation for recreational use is so far limited to cannabis in Uruguay, Alaska, California, Washington and Colorado, Noffs thinks there will be a domino effect. “It’s inevitable, partly because big pharma and those behind the recreational cannabis push in the US are going for it, so there’s a market force there, but also, people are starting to see…

Pill testing in Australia has taken another positive step forward, with a Northern Territory minister stating it should be made available at music festivals. NT Assistant Police Minister Jeff Collins said there had been a lot of measures “to try and reduce the number of pills taken, including sniffer dogs and the like.” […]

It’s time for a new perspective on drugs, on addiction and on how we manage drugs as a country. We know how to make Australia the safest place on the planet when it comes to drugs and young people. It’s time to leave the past behind and get on board with pill testing and evidence-based treatment. […]

All UK festivals should provide drug-testing facilities, experts and campaigners have urged, following the deaths of two young people believed to have taken high-strength ecstasy at a festival over the bank holiday weekend. […]

Australia tends to think about drugs in a binary fashion. Do we prohibit this drug? Or is it widely available? The question should no longer be whether to ban drugs or not, perhaps the question on our every law makers lips should be “how much control do we want?” and “what plans are in place to avert the next major…