CALL TO LET PEOPLE RULE ON HEROIN TRIAL

POLITICIANS should defer to local communities over whether to allow trials
of heroin injecting room in Victoria, the Australian Drug Foundation said
yesterday.Geoff Munro, who heads the foundation's Youth Drug Studies
Centre, said MPs who voted against the trial of injecting facilities were
denying local communities the right to choose how they tackled the issue.

"Ultimately, politicians should allow the communities in the most
drug-affected areas to decide," he said.

"It is they who have to cope with the drug-use on their streets and the
worst effects.

"By voting yes to the trial, politicians are merely enabling communities to
make the final decision."

But the foundation the nation's leading drug research and education
agency said politicians should take their time in deciding a stance on the
controversial issue.

"Lots of MPs are rushing to judgment and it's way too early for them to be
forming a view." Mr Munro said.

The call for community consultation came after the Bracks Government's plan
to set up five supervised injecting rooms in Melbourne appeared doomed this
week when key Independent and Opposition MPs, on whose support the enabling
legislation depends, expressed reservations about the plan.

Mr Munro's plea for patience was backed by David Penington, chairman of the
Bracks Government's Drugs Policy Advisory Committee, who said concerns
expressed by the state Liberal and National Party leaders this week were
premature.

"Look, a lot of this is silly hype whipped up by journalists", Professor
Penington said. "The debate has a long way to go and people have yet to
consider the facts in any detail. Most MPs don't even have the full
(advisory committee) report yet."

Premier Steve Bracks rejected a call from National Party leader Peter Ryan
for his Government to shelve the experiment until the results of a similar
trial in Sydney become clear.

"We don't want to stand by and watch people die," Mr Bracks said.

A hundred Victorians had died from heroin overdoses already this year a
toll that demanded action, he said.

Mr Munro said Victoria must have its own trial, rather than looking to the
NSW experiment, because there were many differences between the two capitals.

"Victoria now has the highest rate of heroin deaths, and we need to test
what works in our city and its sub-cultures."

He said critics of the injecting room trials had so far failed to suggest
any alternative strategies to save lives and address the public health
issues of discarded syringes and people using drugs on the streets.

"Not trying this will just ensure the death toll from heroin continues to
escalate," he said.