FOOTSCRAY NEEDS A RADICAL FIX FOR ITS DRUG PROBLEM

Nick Fahey (8/3) is right about Footscray being "a fantastic place to
live, work and visit". But it would be a mistake to ignore or to play
down the seriousness of the drug problem here.

Central Footscray is awash with drug-related crime. Soon after moving
here from West Footscray two years ago, we were burgled three times in
four weeks. Addicts have come to our property to use the tap.
Potential thieves have knocked on the door "casing the joint". Deals
have been made in cars outside our house, needles thrown out the
window. And one Sunday recently, under the tree outside our house,
there was a young couple with their one-year-old baby, changing his
nappy and shooting up at the same time. So your recent report (5/3) on
the drug trade in Footscray was no news to us.

Like most residents, we have helped the police on several occasions,
providing information that has led to arrests. We are trying to be
good citizens and "clean up the neighbourhood". But there's just too
much heroin - too much demand and too much supply - and it's just too
profitable an industry for the unscrupulous to ignore.

The police are vigilant and hard-working but they can't stop it. More
or less heroin might be intercepted, but nobody in the area is holding
their breath that things are going to change any time soon. We need a
radical plan.

I am in favour of not only heroin injecting rooms, but government provision
of correct doses of untainted heroin to registered addicts. The system
could work this way in "heroin hot spots" such as Footscray: government and
welfare agencies work together to identify and register known local
addicts; a discreet shopfront is set up in the commercial area close to the
station, where qualified nursing staff would assess the health of
"patients" and give them their first injection and supply the correct doses
for the rest of the day. An addict would have to visit every day to avoid
building up saleable supplies.

The advantages of this would be many: dealers would lose their market
overnight. The health and prospects of addicts would be improved.
Burglary would be substantially reduced. Police would be freed up to
attend to other matters. Drug addiction would lose its gloss - instead
of being a cutting-edge rebel on the fringes of society, an addict
becomes a dreary government-dependent nobody, just like lining up for
the dole.

The illegality of heroin doesn't work. Let's accept there will always
be heroin addicts and spare ourselves the costly side effects. I
expect most people would reject such a plan, and it would be difficult
to sell to the voters. But ask yourself this question: what do you
think will be the future of the baby we saw last week?

Lauren Basil,
Footscray