Roads Minister overruled on cocaine driver testing after ignoring police pleas
THE NSW Roads Minister has snubbed her nose at repeated pleas from police to test drug-drivers for cocaine, forcing the Premier to overrule her during the deadliest road toll period in years.
NSW
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THE NSW Roads Minister has snubbed her nose at repeated pleas from police to test drug-drivers for cocaine, forcing the Premier to overrule her during the deadliest road toll period in years.
Documents released under freedom of information laws shed light on the conflicting road safety priorities at a time when pressure is steadily building on governments to tackle the road toll.
The introduction of cocaine testing for motorists was included in the NSW Government’s suite of measures on January 15 to tackle the unrelenting road trauma.
However, it was only after Premier Gladys Berejiklian, returning from Christmas holidays to one of the deadliest road toll periods in several years, overruled Roads Minister Melinda Pavey’s strong objections to the move.
The intervention came after Police Minister Troy Grant’s repeated calls for the testing regimen fell on deaf ears.
In August, 2017, Mr Grant wrote to Ms Pavey asking her to make a legislative tweak to the Road Transport Act that would give police the green light to start testing motorists for cocaine.
At the time, police could only use the saliva swab tests to detect cannabis, methamphetamine and MDMA.
“I would greatly appreciate your assistance and that of your department, in enabling this important strengthening of our drug driving regimen to occur,” Mr Grant wrote.
Mr Grant followed up with another letter in November, informing Ms Pavey the DrugWipe 3S devices were ready to go after successful testing.
“This overcomes a key reason that the government and its predecessors have publicly stated as to why cocaine has not been included in the MDT regimen,” he wrote.
Foreshadowing an objection, Mr Grant admitted while the data didn’t suggest cocaine was a major factor in fatal and serious crashes, “the increasing level of drug use” created a road safety issue that must be addressed.
The Centre for Road Safety, which advises on policy and drives road safety initiatives, was not swayed, pointing out only 11 drivers involved in fatal crashes between 2012-2016 had cocaine in their system.
That contrasted with 292 drivers found with methamphetamine, cannabis or MDMA in their system.
Quoting these figures, Ms Pavey informed the Dubbo MP the cocaine testing plan would not go ahead.
“In light of the road safety evidence, it is recommended the proposal not be pursued at this time,” she wrote to Mr Grant late last year.
In early January, The Sunday Telegraph published a story about NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller pushing for roadside cocaine testing after 393 people died in crashes last year.
Prompting the publicity, CRS executive director Bernard Carlon gave the minister’s office a “heads up” about the story.
Ms Pavey’s chief-of-staff replied, asking for data around cocaine users involved in serious or fatal crashes.
“We need to show you can’t just call for change without data,” Edward Martin wrote.
* Follow Ava Benny-Morrison on Twitter @avabmorrison