The plan against P
John Key has announced a wide range of measures, as part of a plan to reduce the supply of, demand for, and harm caused by P. The main measures are:
- Making pseudoephedrine a Class B2 controlled drug, making it prescription-only. (I have attached the report from Sir Peter Gluckman recommending this)
- Use proceeds of crime legislation to fund additional Police and Customs activities to fight gangs and organised crime plus an expansion of drug treatment services.
- Investing in additional $22 million in clinical services to fund treatment for P addiction to more than 3,000 additional patients over the next three years.
- Assigning 40 additional Customs officers to special dedicated drug-taskforce duties to help break the supply chain. Key also announced in just two weeks Customs has managed to make 26 seizures of ingredients with a street value of $13 million if they had been used to produce P.
- A new Police Methamphetamine Control Strategy which aims to use intelligence in new ways to target gangs, investigate drug syndicates which import P precursors illegally, target P ‘cooks’ and seize funds and assets gained through P-related activity.
- Reviewing the outdated Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Act 1966, to provide a more effective legal means to get P-addicts into compulsory assessment and treatment.
- Making chief executives of Government agencies accountable for delivering on our plans, as measured against a range of targets that will be clearly set out in the actual Action Plan to be released next week.
The status quo has obviously failed. It is good to see that the plan does not just try to target one aspect, but is a balance of measures that aim to reduce supply, reduce the demand for P, and reduce the harm caused by those addicted to it – which is far far wider than self harm.
The Gluckman report is here – Pseudoephedrine report.
A recent story on how destructive the addiction to P is, was a great story in the HoS by Carolyne Meng-Yee on Lynne Carter:
One of Auckland’s poshest hotels has turfed out a high-profile socialite, saying her erratic behaviour has scared guests and staff and claiming she has left her $600-a-night suite uninhabitable. …
The eviction of Carter, who is facing methamphetamine and fraud charges in the Auckland District Court, is the latest twist in a sad fall from grace for the businesswoman who once boasted a $6 million waterfront mansion, a Ferrari and a booming property development business.
She was set for life.
“She smokes and we don’t allow smoking, and her dog pisses everywhere,” Bourke said. “We have chucked her out many times but she keeps coming back in the middle of the night.” …
“She was smoking all the time and the dog was in the room. It was peeing everywhere.
“She would get up in the middle of the night … She was out like till 3am, running up and down the hallways calling out ‘Louis, Louis’ and we had complaints from guests saying ‘who is the woman running up and down the hallway screaming?’
“Or we would have functions on… It was horrible, it really was.”
On another occasion, Bourke said Carter sat in the Herne Bay hotel’s library, staring vacantly at the ceiling.
And if not bad enough:
Bourke said that, in her opinion, Carter had “gone from someone who was well-dressed and well-spoken… and she has turned into a country bumpkin who walks around with no shoes and dirty hair”.
Bourke said Mollies could not hire out her suite because of the stench of dog urine and stale cigarette smoke. “We have to air it a little bit longer to get rid of the smell.”
And that is just a case of self-harm, and is nothing compared to the cases of William Bell, Antonie Dixon, and others where innocent Kiwis get butchered in P fuelled rages.