Health and service groups call on Government to repeal drug laws
More than 25 health and social service organisations have banded together to call on the Government to repeal the country’s drug laws, to drop penalties for use and to treat the use of drugs as a health issue.
The groups, including the New Zealand Medical Association, the Mental Health Foundation, the Public Health Association, the Ma¯ori Law Society, the Drug Foundation, Hapai te Hauora, and JustSpeak, have written to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, Health Minister Andrew Little and Justice Minister Kris Faafoi.
JustSpeak, a youth advocacy group for criminal justice reform, has spearheaded the letter and director Tania Sawicki Mead said the current law, the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975, was not fit for purpose.
“To prevent harm, the Government needs to put into gear a pragmatic response by putting energy and resources into drug treatment services and community support, not punishment. “
She said support for the change came from both sides of the last year’s cannabis debate and referendum — in which a bid to legalise recreational cannabis was lost by 48.4 per cent in favour to 50.7 per cent against.
The clinical director of the National Hauora Coalition Dr Rawiri McKree Jansen said the current criminal justice approach to dugs caused harm and that harm inequitably affected Ma¯ori.
“Drug convictions and the associated stigma have lifelong consequences, particularly on access to housing, education and employment. This in turn can have significant impacts on hauora [wellbeing], not only for individuals but also for their whanau.”
Drugs Foundation executive director Sarah Helm commended the Government for recent moves to make festival drug testing permanent, and for amendments to the Misuse of Drugs Act which set in law allowing police discretion to not prosecute a person for use if a therapeutic approach would be more beneficial to the public interest.
But she said the next step was a re-write of the law that was grounded in an evidence, health-based approach and harm reduction rather than a punitive approach for users — effectively decriminalisation.
“We have been almost fooling ourselves that we have been addressing drug use in New Zealand just by banning it because we know that convictions do nothing to deter use. While we’ve been doing that, we’ve had the blinkers on to everything else that needs to be in place.”
She said many groups that had been opposed to legalisation in the referendum had not opposed decriminalisation.
She said they were not talking about legalising trafficking or dealing in drugs.
“That would still be illegal in our current model. Our recommended approach to decriminalisation is that possession is still illegal but carries no penalties.”