TIME FOR EDUCATION NOT CAPITULATION

It may be that Peter FitzSimons has put his head into one scrum too many, or
that he failed to read further into The 1998 National Drug Strategy
Household Survey.

This survey showed that most Australians do not support his call for the
legalisation of drugs. Less than 30 per cent of Australians aged 14 and over
support the legalisation of marijuana even for personal use, and less than
10 per cent support the legalisation of heroin, cocaine or amphetamines.

The Rev Ted Noffs, the founder of life education centres in Australia, said
in 1979: "Drugs will be with humankind from here on out. When we
realistically accept this situation, we realise that there is only one thing
that matters: the education of our children. The question of how we reduce
the demand for drugs is a question of the philosophy of life; if you like, a
spiritual question ... It is a question about the meaning of life itself and
its values, of what we consider a human personality to be, of what we
understand by human existence."

He was and is right. Now is the time for education not capitulation.

Jay R. Bacik, Life Education Australia, Potts Point, April 18.