Yes, a Marijuana-led Recovery
by Samela Harris

The Advertiser, Wednesday, February 24, 1999
Issues, page 18

Why do Adelaide people keep telling you the place is dying and they all have gloomy statistics at their fingertips to prove it? This was the question posed to a Sydney journalist by the world's hottest travel writer, Bill Bryson.

The peripatetic American humorist was just beginning his exploration of Australia in the cause of a new Down Under book. But it seems that a brief visit to Adelaide some years ago already had marked him with an impression of our negativity.

What sort of carping, chip-on-the-shoulder, inferiority-complex, backwater psychology do we have that we have to tell our visitors that we are going down the gurgler? Okay, the State Bank catastrophe was crippling and traumatic. Okay, so nasty Jeff Kennett stole our well-run Grand Prix. Okay, so we're not perfect and we are in an awkward geographical location as a middle State with the desert breathing hot dust down our back. But this is no reason for us to have turned into our own worst enemies.

So much for those halcyon Dunstan days when things moved forwards and people moved here to be part of the action. Dunstan has gone and so have all semblances of courage and innovation.

Thus I suppose there is really no point at all in suggesting that we stick our necks way out and put ourselves on the world map by doing something utterly progressive and controversial. But I will, since it could save our bacon. To separate ourselves from the mainstream of Australia and bring ourselves some serious international tourist dollars, we should become the Amsterdam of the south. By this, I mean we should go one step further than our quaint on-the-spot fines for cannabis and legalise the drug in the name of tourism.

It is time we grew up on the drug front. Cannabis is ubiquitous already. It's prohibition only profits dealers and the Government. It stops nothing.

In fact, if one takes the example of Amsterdam where it has been legal for more than a decade, it seems that local usage declines when the drug is legal. The local economy, however, increases as the world comes to revel in the civilised enlightenment.

Of course, civilised enlightenment is not a path that we have followed lately. In fact, the dreaded PM, Mr Howard, is looking forward to a meeting with the head of America's FBI to get fired up on the idea of " zero tolerance" - a policy which has filled American jails to capacity with small offenders while doing nothing to reduce drug consumption. But we South Australians should not be waiting on Mr Howard. The way for us to stay ahead and be special is to do our own thing.

Now, I am not advocating dope smoking or denying that for some it has problematical consequences. Although marijuana is inherently is non-addictive, people can develop dependencies on all sorts of things for all sorts of reasons. But if it was a toss-up between pokies and pot, I would lump for the latter as the more wholesome option.

On the drug front, tobacco addiction and alcoholism are much bigger drug problems than cannabis - and, unlike cannabis, both cost the health system dearly.

About 22.5 million people in the United States alone smoke marijuana - and more than three quarters of these people work full-time or part-time. In other words, dope is not about dropping out or about being constantly zonked out. For most people it's an occasional indulgence.

The interesting thing about legalising marijuana is that the Dutch statistics have established that the rate of indulgence is significantly lower under an emancipated than it is under repressive regimes. Fewer people per capita smoke dope in the Netherlands, where it is legal, than in the US, where it is severely prohibited. The availability of drugs, therefore, does not make people use them. In the US, $18 billion to $26 billion is estimated to be spent on marijuana each year. Repression does not suppress. More than 41 per cent of Australians have tried cannabis at some time. Few of them seem much the worse for wear for it. And it's a "soft" drug that does not bring forth the aggressions of alcohol.

SA pioneered the decriminalisation of marijuana in the '80s - following the Sackville Royal Commission into the Non-Medical Use of Drugs, which was set up by the Dunstan government. These days, we can grow up to 10 cannabis plants for personal use and pay on-the-spot fines for possession - which seems a bit silly, but not as silly as being able to buy a dope pipe over the counter and then be fined for owning it.

Sadly, our Government seems to have used the liberalisation of the laws simply to grab more revenue by nabbing more users. Four times as many people have been "busted" each year since the law was enforced in 1986. I'm told that it's not a matter of more people smoking. It's just easier to catch them. I find that retrogressive and hypocritical.

The recommendations of the National Cannabis Taskforce seems to lean towards legalising the drug very much in the Amsterdam model - home growing and coffee shop commerce. So the building blocks are all there for Adelaide to make it's mark - and heaven knows it needs to do something bold and different.

Why not lead the way as we used to do - and see how long it takes Mr Kennett and his zero-tolerance pals to eat their hearts out with envy as our economy booms with world tourism?