DELAHUNTY JOINS THE POLLIE POT REGIME

Today's baby boomer politicians have a lot to thank Bill Clinton for. Since
the US President admitted early in his presidential career that he smoked
marijuana at university - without inhaling, of course - many powerbrokers of
his generation have followed suit, revealing that they too have had the
occasional puff.

It's getting to be quite a long list. Former long-serving Labor minister
Gareth Evans and Foreign Minister Alexander Downer were among the first to
put up their hands in the early 1990s by admitting they had smoked pot when
they were university students.

And just last year, when still in opposition, Premier Steve Bracks confessed
that he had imbibed during his university days but "it really didn't do
much" for him.

Education Minister Mary Delahunty is the latest to join the club.

Asked yesterday, at the launch of the State Government's Get Wise drug
education kit whether she had smoked dope at university, Ms Delahunty was
quick to respond.

"I thought you might ask me that ... yes, I did ... and that's it," she
said.

But it seems the minister did not take the advice that the kit, which is
based on the harm minimisation approach, gives to teachers. A section on
possible scenarios says teachers, if asked by students if they had smoked
dope at university, should "minimise personal disclosures where possible".

But while Ms Delahunty is the latest in a long line of politicians to
confess, her admission about her LaTrobe university days hasn't impressed
Liberal education spokesman Phil Honeywood. He was adamant that he had never
tried the stuff, even though he had been tempted when he was a student at
the Australian National University.

"I never had any desire to try it. It wasn't something I was ever interested
in," he said.

Mr Honeywood said he was disappointed with the minister, saying her
confession to reporters at a Williamstown Secondary College was
inappropriate.

"Ms Delahunty is the education minister and she is meant to be a role model.
It's unfortunate that a school environment was the forum for her to publicly
state her own drug-taking," he said.

But drug education expert Geoff Munro, of the Australian Drug Foundation,
said Ms Delahunty's revelation should come as no surprise because figures
showed that more than 40 per cent of adults had experimented with cannabis
at least once. "It's ironic that a politician is being criticised for being
honest," he said. "We need to acknowledge that drug use is rife right
throughout our society."