Posts by Russell Brown
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Okay, it'll be difficult for Audioculture to post this (rights and all), but I just stumbled across this and I might as well post it here. Me on Radio With Pictures in in 1986:
Intriguingly, there's a touch of the the "old", slightly reedy, New Zealand accent in my speech.
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Hard News: Illegal Highs, in reply to Mellopuffy,
I'm hearing a few stories about black-market products -- including the problematic already-banned ones. Exactly what's going on out there is not entirely evident.
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Props to Bomber for showing up Trevor Mallard for the know-nothing he is.
Mallard just pulled his "no one is ever jailed for pot possession" out of his ass -- and carried on even after he was shown evidence of how wrong he is.
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Hard News: Illegal Highs, in reply to Damian Christie,
I’ve just come back from a week in Colorado, looking at the effects of legalisation there. I’ll write a post about it as soon as I have time, but spoiler alert: there were no naked people in trees setting fire to their children.
Welcome back! Really looking forward to reading that.
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The Drug Foundation's press statement just now:
Use powers in existing law says Drug Foundation
The announcement of changes to the Psychoactive Substances Act to remove currently approved ‘legal highs’ from sale is disappointing due to its political nature, and will lead to stockpiling and black-market sales the New Zealand Drug Foundation said.
“The law already allows for the removal of psychoactive products from the market if it can be shown they are causing harm. This is just politicians playing politics at a time when we need a measured response to a very complex issue,” New Zealand Drug Foundation Executive Director Ross Bell said.
“Rather than rush an amendment through Parliament under urgency, the Psychoactive Substance Act can be used to identify the products which are causing harm and these can be removed from sale.
“The National Poisons Centre and the Centre for Adverse Reaction Monitoring are collecting data on which products are causing harm. Using their information we can ascertain which products are the ones that are causing such concern in our communities.”
Mr Bell said that using the law as it was originally intended would avoid the negative effects that an immediate ban would result in.
“As we’ve seen before with previous bans, retailers hold firesales for products and consumers stockpile those. There’s an added risk that people will binge, or use higher quantities prior to the ban. Predictably, many of these products will make it onto the black market, over which the government has little control.
“This is disappointing considering we reached an uncontroversial political consensus on the way forward only 10 months ago.”
Mr Bell said that the Government now has an obligation to support those who chose to stop using psychoactive products and to closely monitor the soon to be unapproved substances.
“Extra support needs to be made available to the people who chose to stop using psychoactive products as the ban comes into place,” Mr Bell said.
“It is important that we help these people out and ensure that they can access detox and help services.
“Ensuring these people get help will also ensure that demand for these products is lowered over all.”
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Hard News: Sorting out our thinking on drugs, in reply to BenWilson,
That a whole lot of really intelligent people didn’t is actually astonishing. I guess the genius was the allure of “incremental” policy. It sound soooo scientific, so reasonable.
I do understand your argument, but I’ve always been pretty clear that the PSA on its own and as it stands was never enough. I want to see drug use decriminalised but I’m also fine with the state having a regulatory role the way way it does with the food we eat.
It’s worth noting that had Labour’s proposed amendment to the PSA succeeded last year there would have been no penalty for possession of unapproved substances. None. As things stand -- and even with what's happened -- prosecution will be merely unlikely.
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Hard News: Illegal Highs, in reply to BenWilson,
The silver lining is the philosophical bankruptcy of harm reduction policy (elephant in the room style)
Oh, come on. Harm minimisation is what brought us needle exchanges and safe needle drops for IV drug users, and allows pill testing at at dance parties in more enlightened countries. It’s what got all personal drug possession decriminalised in Portugal. It’s a key element of marijuana legalisation in Colorado, and prostitution law reform in New Zealand.
It might not be perfect, but it has actual runs on the board. It seems better than just waiting for things to improve after the prohibitionist apocalypse. But, then, I've always been a dirty incrementalist.
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Hard News: Illegal Highs, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
I would note that the maximum fine for drug dealing/growing/etc. offences is substantially lower than that applying to other psychoactives covered by this regime.
But that $500k fine only applies to a body corporate, not an individual.
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Good post on the issue here by Tim Watkin. Especially this info provided to The Nation:
Nicola Kean, a producer for The Nation, asked the Ministry of Health last week:
“What’s the trend (if any) for people presenting at A+E for problems with psychoactive substances since the law was introduced?”
A written reply on Thursday said:
“While it is early days the Authority has received anecdotal reports demonstrating the number of severe presentations to emergency departments has reduced since the Act came in.
The Authority monitors approved products received from the Centre for Adverse Reactions Monitoring (CARM), and calls from the public to the National Poisons Centre on a regular basis.
These reports also show a reduction in the number of severe issues being reported. Where severe adverse reactions are reported the Authority has the power to act and has already removed products from the market where reports to CARM identified they posed more than a low risk of harm”.
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I've posted some info on maximum penalties relating to synthetic cannabinoids once they're de-approved on the new thread.