When it comes to drugs like cannabis and psilocybin, as the USA moves steadily towards decriminalisation, regulation and therapeutic reform, Australia’s laws remain largely stuck in the past.
On both sides of the Pacific, the situation varies from state to state, with the ACT being the most progressive jurisdiction locally, but it’s become increasingly obvious that the war on drugs is mostly a war on poor and marginalised people.
As Senator David Shoebridge explained to local legal luminary Steve Bolt at Nimbin’s Hemposium on the weekend, when wastewater drug testing was introduced in Australia, so much cocaine was found coming out of eastern Sydney compared to other illegal drugs that they had to create a new kind of graph.
‘But where are police resources being focused on the war on drugs?’ he asked. ‘Not in Double Bay, not in Bondi Junction, not in Randwick, but in Campbelltown and Lismore and Nimbin. It’s such an obvious class/race social project.’
Shoebridge gave the example of the Indigenous community on Groote Eylandt, in the Gulf of Carpentaria, where he’d recently travelled for a Senate inquiry into youth justice.
While the local community opposed alcohol coming on to Country because of the violence that it caused, cannabis has a broad cultural acceptance there.
The response by authorities has been to devote serious police resources to drug screening at the local airport (which is little more than a shed), causing ongoing conflict and dragging more people into the brutal Northern Territory justice system.
$14.3 billion
The latest wastewater testing conducted by the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission across the country shows that billion of dollars is going into the pockets of organised crime each year to pay for illegal drugs, with the cost rising fast. Methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and MDMA alone accounted for an estimated $11.5 billion last year and a staggering $14.3 billion this year.
Although its use has plateaued or reduced in most jurisdictions, cannabis remains the most commonly consumed illegal drug in Australia. Policing of cannabis continues to increase, particularly in road testing situations, while far more dangerous drugs in terms of impairment, like methamphetamines and ketamine, remain comparatively unpoliced.
‘So what does the Australian government do with this data?’ asked Senator Shoebridge. ‘They get awkwardly embarrassed by it and move on to the next thing.’
In Canberra, where the federal politicians work (without facing drug and alcohol testing themselves, unfortunately), a decriminalisation experiment is currently underway, with cannabis users no longer facing imprisonment in most cases.
There remains a tension between national and ACT laws, with federal police being urged by Coalition members to charge people in Canberra under Commonwealth laws, but this has not happened so far.
As Senator Shoebridge explained, his fellow senator Michaelia Cash ran a scare campaign at the time of the ACT legal change suggesting that Lake Burley Griffin would soon be full of drug user tourists in party boats, which hasn’t transpired. Neither has the sky fallen, as predicted.
‘Lake Burley Griffin still as boring as it was two years ago,’ he said.
What about the kids?
With cannabis presenting genuine health risks for adolescents with developing brains, one concern has been about the impacts of decriminalisation on young people.
So far, the Canberra experiment is echoing research in other jurisdictions, where legalisation of cannabis has resulted in no measurable rise in use by under eighteen-year-olds.
Cannabis use among this vulnerable group has actually declined in Colorado, Washington State and Canada since laws were relaxed. At the same time, de-stigmatisation has resulted in an uptake of use among the elderly, those with chronic pain, and war veterans.
In Australia, while medical marijuana progresses in fits and starts, the wider law reform picture remains static.
The issue of police and political corruption associated with illegal drugs remains a major problem, as it was when abortion, homosexuality and alcohol were banned. As Senator Shoebridge put it, ‘One of the reasons we’re not getting sensible drug law reform is because there’s a kind of co-dependency between organised crime and the police and security agencies – they need each other.
‘Organised crime needs crappy laws to make things illegal so that their product can only be sold by them at a premium. Police need the illegal drug laws so they can have the resources and the manpower and the surveillance powers.’
Drug football
Politically, the issue is a football which is often divorced entirely from the expert science and real world experience around the issue.
David Shoebridge’s own 2023 bill to legalise cannabis federally was defeated by Labor and the Coalition, although government data showed that 8.8 million adult Australians had consumed the drug.
Was the government seriously suggesting all these people were criminals? Wouldn’t it make more sense to regulate and legalise the product and apply a sales tax?
He described the attacks on his bill from the major parties and One Nation as ‘cartoonish’, supported by a campaign from the AMA which included demonstrably false data.
Senator Shoebridge says he will continue to attempt to change federal laws relating to cannabis. Despite the coalition of forces ranged against him, he sees this change as inevitable. It’s hard to disagree.
Originally from Canberra, David Lowe is an award-winning filmmaker, writer and photographer with particular interests in the environment and politics. He’s known for his campaigning work with Cloudcatcher Media.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
