It bewilders this old stoner’s brain to think the sunshine state has embraced pragmatic, evidence-based drug reform before NSW
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Queensland’s new law mandating a three-strike system for small-scale drug possession requires police to offer a caution to a first-timer, and diversion and assessment programs for anyone careless enough to get busted two or even three times. This leaves New South Wales as the only state that doesn’t allow cautions for adults possessing drugs other than cannabis, which is itself subject to theIt’s strange to think that Sydney is now a place with a harsher regime for managing drug use than the place once governed by Joh Bjelke-Petersen.
The Queensland Labor government’s new approach was predictably attacked by the opposition’s Deb Frecklington, who said, “We have a government that thinks it is OK to tell my children and tell my constituents that these drugs are minor drugs. Fentanyl, ice, cocaine and heroin are not minor drugs.” But while the politics of the so-called war on drugs never change, nor do the economic forces that guarantee it will be a forever war. The market for drugs – soft, hard, legal and illegal – is massive. “Success” in the war – major interceptions, massive busts of Mister Bigs and so on – simply create a temporary scarcity which drives up prices, bringing new players to the market or encouraging existing operators to increase production and distribution.
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