HEROIN SLIPS THROUGH 'TOUGH ON DRUGS' NET

The Howard Government's $290 million drugs strategy was in question last
night after Australia's police commissioners said it was having "virtually
no impact" on the availability of heroin.

The annual Illicit Drug Report - which gathers data from all police forces -
said that despite increasing seizures of heroin "these detections did not
have any real impact on the overall availability of heroin".

It said the country's police forces believed heroin was being stockpiled by
traffickers but admitted that such stockpiles had eluded police. Heroin
remained easily available in Sydney and Victorian police had reported that
in the past year its availability had grown.

The report by the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence - which is
overseen by the police commissioners - also reveals that heroin is
increasingly being used by young people. The average age of first-time users
had fallen from 26 to just under 20.

Its finding that heroin seizures were having virtually no effect on supply
comes despite moves by the Prime Minister, begun in 1997, to stem
trafficking through the "Tough on Drugs" strategy.

The project includes an extra $75 million to attack the drug trade,
including nationwide rapid response strike teams.

But the report says the easy availability of heroin remains, and is even
increasing in some regions, while the amount seized last year by Customs was
less than the amount seized the year before.

The Federal Justice Minister, Senator Vanstone, has claimed that several
large drug seizures last year - including October's record haul of 400
kilograms of heroin off Port Macquarie - is evidence that the Government's
strategy is working.

She said yesterday that when drug seizures "in the currentfinancial year"
were taken into account it was evident that the Tough on Drugs strategy was
working [the report covers the financial year to last July].

Senator Vanstone said drug seizures in the first seven months of the current
financial year were significantly higher than in previous years.

But the Opposition's justice spokesman, Mr Duncan Kerr, said the report's
finding that heroin prices had not increased but that availability had
showed that Senator Vanstone was "taking the community for a ride".

As the report was released yesterday, Mr Howard announced that $20 million
would go to more than 50 voluntary and community agencies for drug treatment
programs.

He said he had found it distressing that young people with a drug problem
had been unable to get into treatment programs which, until recently, had
mainly been operated by the States.