Page 4122 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 22 October 2019
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
MR HANSON: Minister, why have you ignored the advice of the AMA and the Royal College of Psychiatrists by legalising cannabis?
MR RATTENBURY: I think I have answered that question in my earlier responses today.
Mental health—cannabis
MRS KIKKERT: My question is to the Minister for Mental Health. I refer to a media statement from federal health minister Greg Hunt, who said:
Almost a quarter of Australia’s drug and alcohol treatment services were for people who had identified cannabis as their principle drug of concern …
and
Australia remains committed to the international drug control regime established by UN international drug conventions which do not support the legalisation of cannabis for recreational use.
Why are you ignoring the statistics and the UN international drug conventions on the legalisation of cannabis for recreational use?
MR RATTENBURY: I think it is very clear that the war on drugs has failed—it is clear—and that the just say no approach that Mrs Kikkert is alluding to does not work. We have to accept that after decades of taking that approach, of working on the moral panic that we are seeing, people are starting to take a more nuanced approach to how you do drug policy in the world. We are seeing a range of countries across the planet that are starting to make serious drug law reform because they know that the just say no approach does not work, countries such as Portugal. We are seeing wide-scale liberalisation in the United States. In the United States, people are taking more sophisticated, more nuanced approaches to the issue of drug law reform than the sort of approach that Mrs Kikkert is suggesting here in this chamber today.
MRS KIKKERT: Minister, what extra resources will you commit to making available to assist mental health patients who identify cannabis as their principal drug of concern?
MR RATTENBURY: That was very similar to the question that Mrs Dunne asked me earlier. As I said the ACT government has a range of services available to people coming forward. One of the important parts of the community education that will go on over the next couple of months, before this law comes into force at the end of January, is to make people aware of those services. Some of that work is already being done. I have spoken before in this place about the information that headspace provides to young people who are engaging in the use of cannabis and where it is starting to have an impact on their mental health. That is the sort of discussion that we need to be having with people in our community.
Mr Coe: A point of order.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video