THE POLICE GIVE IT THEIR BEST SHOT BUT THE HEROIN FLOW BARELY SLOWS

The day after the big heroin bust in New South Wales, four junkies stand
outside a St Kilda needle exchange. Nearby, there's a jeep with one
shattered window. Looks freshly burgled.

Sweet surrender to heroin has Paris, Harry, Louise and Brad in its hungry
grip. As longing hurtles them towards their next fix, chaos shadows
fiercely.

Shabby, sickly and newly evicted, they are a straggle of sad stories in the
morning sunshine as the police pull up.

"Jacks!" Harry says, sounding the alarm for the others while keeping a wary
eye on the van.

The record $400 million heroin seizure at Port Macquarie is a distant
concern for the four. Brad marvels that it's "enough to feed every arm in
Australia" but he doubts it will affect supply.

"There's heaps of it," he says.

Brad's 21 and he's been "using" for six years; Louise, 24, has been using
for 18 months.

With this interview, they are happy to be temporarily distracted from the
daily hunt for the $120 worth they need "to feel normal".

Having weaned himself off heroin once before, 37-year-old Paris says he
fell back into the street scene nine months ago.

"If I don't have a hit within two hours of waking, I can't walk. Heroin
shrinks your muscles and when you don't have it they all expand again. Your
bones and marrow and every single joint just aches," he says.

Paris says he's been trying to get into a rehab clinic for three months but
they all have waiting lists of three to four weeks and he hasn't had the
willpower to persist through weeks of phone calls and appointments.

"I say to them, 'What am I going to do? In three or four weeks time I will
be dead'." he says. "You can't even survive a day without the shit, never
mind a month."

Louise agrees. "If you want to go, you want to go right this minute. You
have to ring them every day at nine and where we were living we didn't have
a phone," she says.

Harry's luck had been running on empty since 3am when he claims the manager
at a local hotel had burst into his bedroom, punched him in the face then
evicted him.

He says he'd been thrown out for smoking bongs and it pissed him off
because the manager smoked, too. Brad and Louise got booted out of the
hotel later.

How do they pay for their habits? Without a word, Harry turns towards the
smashed jeep window. He's suggested moments earlier that we be his alibi if
the police asked about it.

"There's a lot of people say junkies are no-hopers. It's just we're people
with problems," Paris says.

Harry cuts quickly to the heart of the matter as he sees it, saying, "We've
no hope."

"It's bad shit once you are addicted, bad shit," says Brad. The sores on
his face graphically illustrate the point. Louise has scabs on her lips.
Heroin sick, not chic.

In a busy office in the heart of the financial district, a professional who
does not want to be identified says he buys the heroin he needs by the gram
- - a $600 "chickpea".

Does he think the big bust in New South Wales could threaten his heroin supply?

"There's certainly no concern among middle-level dealers. There's not a
moment's anxiety," he replies.

Inspector Brian Rix of the Victoria Police drugs squad says it would be
difficult to dispute the assessment.

"You can't say it's right. You can't say it's wrong. It's something I
wouldn't argue with," he says.