VICTORIA TO LOOK AT ALTERNATIVES TO HEROIN INJECTING ROOMS

Increasing the methadone program, extending drug diversion programs and
pushing the Commonwealth on heroin trials are all options being considered
by the Victorian Government now that the State Opposition has rejected
supervised injecting facilities.

Premier Steve Bracks said the government had to look at alternatives to
injecting facilities and "clearly stepping up the methadone program is one
of those".

Mr Bracks said extending the police warning system for drug users was also
an option.

The government announced in April that Victoria's drug diversion program -
trialed since late 1998 in the northern and north-western suburbs - would
expand across the state over the next two years.

"All those things are options obviously and we'll go back to (Dr David)
Penington's committee, we'll have to discuss these matters as you'd expect
with the police commissioner Mr Comrie and police command, and see what is
possible on that missing gap that's there because of the opposition's
position," he told 3AW.

Mr Bracks said he also wanted Prime Minister John Howard to reconsider the
issue of heroin trials.

"I think a proper arranged heroin trial with the Commonwealth auspicing
would be a sensible trial arrangement," he said.

But he said without Federal Government approval, "it's outside our power".

Mr Bracks said the government was honor-bound to put its enabling
legislation for injecting facilities through parliament despite, the
Liberal and National parties - which hold the majority in the upper house -
announcing they would oppose it.

He said the government would re-introduce the legislation if trials had the
support of opposition parties in the future.

Mr Bracks said the government would not back down on injecting facilities,
but nevertheless would move on and other drugs measures would be canvassed
by its drugs adviser, Dr Penington, and his committee.

"There's no one answer to the problem of drugs in our community," he said.
"It's a multiplicity of answers - it's education, it's prevention, it's
saving lives, it's harm minimisation."

Victoria's former drug squad chief John McKoy said this week that heroin
trials were the "next logical step" now that injecting facilities were
doomed, and he urged the Commonwealth to revisit the issue with the United
Nations.

Mr McKoy said he believed most of the community saw heroin trials as the
answer to the state's drug problem because overseas experience showed they
reduced crime and overdose death rates.

Opposition health spokesman Robert Doyle, who has previously announced his
support of prescription heroin trials, said the issue was "a red herring".

He said Mr McKoy had the "wrong end of the stick". He said parliament
needed to look at issues such as treatment and policing.

"They are the basic building blocks before you start looking for some magic
bullet solution," he said.

Mr Doyle said he was disappointed that Mr McKoy had indicated policing
methods were not working given his involvement with the force.

The government has indicated injecting rooms legislation will be debated in
October.