SCHOOL TAKES DRUGS LEAD

The issue is not whether Kaitaia College should introduce drug testing but
that the school should need to do it at all.

The college's board of trustees has approved the introduction of new rules
under which students suspended for taking drugs may be asked to prove they
are not using methamphetamine (known as speed or, in its pure form, "P")
before being allowed back to school.

The school appears to have paid little heed to the cries from human rights
activists or to the education ministry's injunction to tread warily because
of legal issues.

And good on Kaitaia College, whose principal William Tailby says if families
don't like it they are free to choose another school.

The school is taking a stand against an insidious drug that blights lives,
and destroys the prospects of the young.

The drug is manufactured by unscrupulous people who capitalise both on the
high premium its illegality attracts and the fact that police resources are
insufficient to smash the trade and put the perpetrators behind bars.

P has been linked to a series of high-profile, violent crimes, including a
triple murder at the Mt Wellington-Panmure RSA Club, which led Parliament to
reclassify methamphetamine as a Class A drug.

That means manufacturers in clandestine laboratories and those who sell it
to kids can face life sentences.

The behaviour of methamphetamine users can be so irrational that they are
extremely dangerous to others.

Recently in Auckland, police who have to deal with increasingly violent
criminals using the drug have asked for lightweight, covert body armour to
protect themselves from screwdrivers and knives.

A police spokesman said many high-speed pursuits were of drivers using P:
"That is why they are not stopping. They don't care about the circumstances.
When they do get them they are just fighting and fighting."

In the last budget a $13.2 million programme over four years was announced
along with a specialist police team to deal with the rapid increase in
methamphetamine manufacture. But it may be too late.

Nine methamphetamine labs were found in 2000. Last year that number was 150.

Hitherto passive control that includes legislation but has not provided the
muscle to police the law, has no doubt assisted the spread of a range of
banned, and thus increasingly valuable, substances.

Schools feel the rough edge of society's ills. Often they are hobbled when
they attempt to treat a problem.

In this case, a school is bravely taking the initiative in an area notorious
for drug abuse to send a compelling message to those who use or sell speed,
or who turn a blind eye to it.

Last year 1471 students were suspended from schools for taking drugs.
Education is too important to be held to ransom by the drug trade.

A school has to be uncompromising in enforcing standards, if those standards
are not apparent elsewhere.