DRUGS, GUNS AND A DEADLY CONNECTION

A prohibitionist approach to drugs is spawning violence.

A better answer must be found.

THE outbreak of shootings involving police and civilians in Victoria
and New South Wales has sparked immediate calls for a strengthening of
the nation's gun laws. The truth is that Australia has already been
through the process of toughening its gun laws and the voluntary
surrender of 600,000 weapons since 1996. This has undoubtedly removed
many guns from those places where they are most likely to cause death
and injury: the homes of ordinary Australians.

There are strong indications that some, if not all, of the tragic
shootings that have shattered normally peaceful streets in Melbourne
and the New South Wales provincial city of Wollongong are
drugs-related. The extent to which this is so will only become fully
apparent as those responsible are brought before the courts in due
course.

This, of course, is a different problem to the wanton, irrational
violence at Port Arthur that initiated the gun law reforms.
Restricting the availability of firearms can help the fight against
crime, but making them harder to obtain will not itself prevent the
problem. Professional criminals - especially those involved in the
lucrative trade in illegal drugs - can usually be expected to obtain
weapons if they want them, regardless of legal impediments placed in
their way.

The nexus between drugs and the violence that flows from the trade in
them again raises the question of whether existing approaches to the
prevention of drug abuse are working.

Two distinct directions have emerged in the drugs control
debate.

On the one hand, the Prime Minister, Mr John Howard, advocates a
``zero tolerance'' approach of the type pursued in parts of the United
States. In effect, this simply builds on the existing prohibitions by
making enforcement the main tactic and the penalties more severe.

An alternative approach is advocated by the NSW director of public
prosecutions, Mr Nicholas Cowdery, who proposes regulating the heroin
trade by licensing dealers and taxing their activities. It is an
effective admission from a senior operative on the front line in the
fight against drugs that prohibition has failed, and that better
tactics must be adopted. Mr Cowdery's proposal has been cautiously
described as worthy of consideration by Victoria's Premier, Mr Jeff
Kennett, who has also criticised the Prime Minister for his refusal to
countenance a legal heroin trial.

Progress on Australia's mounting heroin problem will be made only when
politicians accept the need to address drug abuse as a social ill
rather than a simple criminal activity.

The apparent outbreak of drug-related violence in the past is more
evidence that the problem is now spiralling out of control.

Ever tougher gun laws, zero tolerance, harsher penalties...these
measures will not provide the answers.