Real drug reform too hard in NSW

There is a well-proven maxim that what a government wishes to hide, goes out in press releases late on Friday afternoon or, better yet, before a public holiday. In that case, the New South Wales government desperately wants to avoid scrutiny about its response to its own Special Commission of Inquiry into the Drug ‘Ice’.

The Inquiry cost roughly $11 million and received hundreds of submissions. The final report roundly condemned the ‘tough on crime’ approach and recommended a total overhaul of how to deal with drug users. It damned current policing practices and, based on evidence from around the world, strongly recommended decriminalising low-level personal use.

In the end, as widely anticipated, the government rejected decriminalisation and is instead patting itself on the back for its plan to copy other Australian jurisdictions’ tepid ‘diversion’ approach. That is if, according to Premier Dominic Perrottet’s self-congratulatory waffling, the Police Commissioner agrees. And even then, it will be completely at police discretion.

This, apparently, was why it took more than two years for the government to issue its lacklustre response. As far back as 2020, stories were being leaked to the media about ‘internal divisions’ and cabinet ministers quaking at the thought of being seen as ‘soft on drugs’.

It is hard to see serious opposition to shaking up drug policy emanating from Labor or the Greens. Nor would it be likely to come from the legal societies, health services, or youth services who spoke out in favour of decriminalisation.

So where lies the problem?

From the outside, it looks suspiciously like it took a change of Police Commissioner before even a thoroughly watered down compromise position was deemed acceptable for public release. Despite this, there has not been a single peep about senior police seemingly having veto power over government policy.

Let us not kid ourselves that this is to protect public safety or impressionable young people, even though it is shrouded in a level of moral preachiness that would put even Nancy ‘Just Say No’ Reagan to shame. It is because ‘police issue fines to stoners and pill popping partygoers’ utterly lacks the public relations oomph of ‘police are the thin blue line that stands between decent human beings and a legion of dangerous druggies.’

The latest NSW statistics about drug use and possession (not selling or trafficking) puts the rate of those offences about on par with domestic violence, which, as we are frequently told, takes up a massive amount of police time and resources.

If drug use was decriminalised, Police Commissioners would lose one of their most powerful arguments for never, ever cutting police budgets. It would suddenly become that much harder to demand more money, more personnel, and more laws that require more money and people to enforce. Worse still, at least from a Commissioner’s viewpoint, decriminalisation would inevitably result in money being redirected away from police and into health and other services like counselling. Losing all the lovely cash that flows from having as many things as possible in the criminal sphere would deal a crippling blow to egos and standing in a system where departmental ladder climbers rank their power, progression, and status by how much taxpayer’s money they can extort from Cabinet.

Interestingly, just over the border, the Australian Capital Territory is proceeding down the decriminalisation path. It is surely mere coincidence that ACT policing is provided by an arm of the Australian Federal Police, and that the AFP’s justification for funding rests squarely on disrupting activities such as drug trafficking rather than punishing the users who are the lowest rung on the ladder.

It is easy to get away with tough-on-drugs empire building because most people have little interest in taking drugs and, let us be honest, nobody likes junkies. But the incentive for Commissioners (and their ambitious would-be replacements) to bring as many human behaviours as possible under their remit, and to scream hysterically at the suggestion of anything ever being changed, does not begin or end with drugs.

Clinging tooth and nail to criminalisation as a solution for humanity’s ills has nothing to do with saving lives, improving community wellbeing, or choosing the best directions for society overall. It is, however, the ultimate key to the modern police state – a Faustian affair in which police apparatchiks will gladly be the tool of authoritarian politics, but only when they are the ones who get to decide what the actual policies will be.

After spending millions to find out how to do things better, then deciding to not do things better, it is no wonder the NSW government wants to avoid questions. Yet the only one truly remaining is just how steep a price they are willing to pay for this.