Page 1943 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 15 June 1994
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Certainly, on one occasion when I raised this issue with the office of the Attorney-General, after somebody had approached me, the matter was resolved and people were given an appropriate time to pay that fine. It is important for us to realise that this is causing a problem for some disadvantaged members of our society. We have to be very careful that we do not penalise people for not being wealthy or not being in the position to expiate what is essentially not a crime in the first place in that it has no impact on other people. Remember that we are not talking about trafficking or selling; we are talking about personal use and personal possession and personal growing. I think that is the critical factor.
I have heard the argument that, if they have enough money to buy dope, then they have enough money to pay the fine, and I think there is some weight to that. But let me remind members that, when we introduced and debated this legislation, we accepted that growing ought to be part of the legislation, even up to five plants. By including growing, we would be looking at a set of circumstances whereby somebody who was involved in the personal use of marijuana did not have to become involved in that network of drug pushing and drug trafficking.
Trying to ensure that young people are kept out of that network is one of the critical factors in the war on drugs. It is absolutely critical that we look at those networks, because they are what makes prohibition such a wonderful system for drug dealers and drug traffickers. They are based on a pyramid selling system, a system that we know is so successful that we outlaw it in Australia. That is why it has worked so successfully worldwide. In 1992, Giorgio Giocomelli, the executive director of the UN International Drug Control Program, in a press conference in Canberra stated that in that year, 1992, the illicit drug trade had surpassed the petroleum industry in profitability. It had become the second most profitable business in the world. That is the level of problem we are dealing with. That is the problem in having a pyramid sales system outside the law. It is that pyramid sales system that we ought to be trying to deal with, and I believe that these expiation notice systems attempt to do that.
The third issue in this Bill is the question of police discretion. Currently, the police have three possibilities if they come across somebody possessing small amounts of cannabis. They can issue a verbal warning, or not take any action; so they have that discretion. They have a second discretion whereby they can issue an expiation notice, and they have a third discretion whereby they can charge somebody. It is that third discretion that I believe we ought not to leave with the police. This Assembly determined that we wished to have a system of expiation notices and, therefore, we ought not to leave police in the situation where they have to make a choice as to whether they are going to charge somebody or issue a fine. They should be able simply to issue a fine, or, as the case may be, ignore the matter, and then it is finished.
Madam Speaker, one issue I have discussed with the Attorney-General is the notion of whether the police should have the discretion where people are growing cannabis - because we allow five plants. Many of us are aware that a plant can be either a foot high or a very substantial bush that is fence height. In those circumstances, we could be talking about a significant amount of cannabis. At this stage, I do not believe that that has been a problem; but, most importantly, we are interested in breaking down those networks. I believe that we should still deal with that matter in terms of an
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