Foreign Correspondent journo ‘blown away’ in pill testing investigation at European festivals

Tom Tilley has been to his share of festivals, but he’s never seen anything like the contents of a wheelie bin at the UK’s Boomtown.

Huge crowds at Boomtown in the UK.

Tom Tilley’s European tour of festival pill testing techniques left him with one searing memory.

Behind the scenes at the UK’s Boomtown Fair, Tilley smelled it before he saw it — a wheelie bin full of confiscated drugs.

“I was blown away seeing that,” he told news.com.au ahead of Tuesday night’s Foreign Correspondent, an episode that explores the frontline of pill testing solutions around the world.

“They were testing kilos of drugs. I’d never seen anywhere near that much drugs, it was crazy to see.”

On #ForeignCorrespondent this week - @TomTilley drops in on some of Europe's biggest music festivals to witness drug testing in action. @triplej pic.twitter.com/CxMlPVwRUN

— ForeignCorrespondent (@ForeignOfficial) September 14, 2019

The ABC journalist was given access to an operation that could one day be rolled out at Australian music festivals.

It works like this. Drugs are confiscated or surrendered upon entry, poured into a wheelie bin and transported through the festival grounds to a police compound where the drugs are tested.

Organisers know they can’t confiscate every drug, so they test what’s being carried into the event.

A private company called Tictac uses a team of chemists to quickly identify harmful chemicals in ecstasy, MDMA, ketamine and cocaine.

Tilley said the tests found dangerous ingredients including PMMA and N-ethylpentylone — substances that are sold as MDMA but can be fatal.

Once harmful drugs are identified, festivalgoers are alerted on social media and an app downloaded more than 55,000 times.

A drug confiscation bin at Boomtown in the UK.

Boomtown crowds in the UK.

“Within an hour of the alert going out, people were coming in and disposing of them,” Tilley said.

It’s not the frontline pill testing that some advocates want to see in Australia, but some people think it could pave the way for that in the future.

Tilley travelled to Switzerland for the Zurich Street Parade where frontline testing is happening.

There, drug users can line up to have their pills tested before deciding whether to hand them over or take them in.

He said of more than 850,000 people who attended, only 94 tests were carried out.

“It’s not a huge number,” Tilley said. “It takes about half an hour but some people did stand there patiently waiting, sober.”

Advocates argue the debate around pill testing is about saving lives, and Tilley said that if nothing changes in Australia, it’s very likely there will be another fatality this summer.

Pill testing at a festival in Switzerland.

A pill testing machine at a recent Australian trial. Picture: Jeremy Piper/AAP

He said he’s hopeful that common sense prevails within political circles and politicians out-of-touch with young people in their electorate start listening.

“There is a generational element there,” he told news.com.au.

“It’s partly about the politicians in power at this point in time coming from a very different cultural standpoint.”

He said he understands the fear that pill testing could be seen as a “green light” for drug users to partake in risky behaviour.

“On the outside it looks like such an endorsement of taking drugs,” Tilly said. “Even if it did somehow encourage drug use, the downside would be outweighed by the safety benefits.”

‘Testing Times’ aired on Foreign Correspondent on Tuesday night on ABC TV and iview