Des Houghton: Time to unleash dogs on drug users at unis, schools and concerts

Canine action is required to help stop the nation sleepwalking into a drugs catastrophe, writes Des Houghton, and they should target schools, universities, nightclubs, union rallies and key areas of our cities. HAVE YOUR SAY

Should drug detection dogs be used on university campuses, at high schools and music festivals?

Yes, yes, yes.

And should the clever canines be trained for random searches at nightclubs, union rallies and cities such as the Gold Coast and Cairns where drug abuse is rife?

Yes, yes, and yes again.

An internal report compiled for Queensland Corrective Services should ring alarm bells. It says that 86 per cent of those in custody admitted using drugs.

Drugs have overwhelmed the justice and child safety departments, the mental health and hospital emergency departments – and now prisons.

Police officers and sniffer dog drug detection specialists. Photo Contributed

This is why sniffer dogs used successfully at airports by police and Border Force officers should be used more widely.

I’ll go further and say random saliva testing is also needed if we have any hope of containing
drug crime.

A sensible starting point would be the compulsory saliva testing for anyone convicted of drug offences. Stigmatising yes, but necessary.

I can already hear howls of protest from the snivelling left. Random tests with sniffer dogs are a breach of an individual’s human rights, they will tell you.

And sniffer dogs may register false positives. True.

However, the nation is sleepwalking into a drugs catastrophe so you mustn’t be too upset if your civil liberties are slightly infringed for the greater good.

Random breath testing is also an infringement of your civil rights, but we have come to accept it.

Random drug testing will save young lives. Unleash the hounds.

The Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission wastewater drug monitoring program suggests to me this great nation is losing the battle against drugs.

The rise and rise of crystal meth has led to torture and deaths. It has been named the devil’s drug for good reason. Even babies are not spared.

Drug detection dogs are trained to find crystal meth and other harmful drugs like heroin, ecstasy and cannabis.

These drugs are the source of unimaginable criminal violence with the daily disruptions in hospital emergency wards by addicts.

Then there is the mental health wreckage that follows.

Police and Sniffer dogs outside the Big Day Out, Sydney Olympic Park. File picture.

We have the power to detect harmful drugs, and we are not using it.

I’m told the Queensland police force has virtually abandoned random drug testing of drivers because officers are too busy attending domestic violence incidents.

The warning in the department of Corrective Services correspondence was clear: “Research in Australia indicates higher rates of coexisting substance use among people in custodial and community corrections.”

And drug-related harm “significantly impacts community health and social wellbeing and often contributes to crime, recidivism and other social harm”.

Alcohol abuse was also high.

“Data indicates 86 per cent of individuals in custody reported using drugs, and 67 per cent consumed alcohol at hazardous levels while involved in risky or offending behaviour” the briefing document said.

Nearly half of all those taken into custody admitted drugs and booze were a contributing factor in their offending – and reoffending.

It’s a cycle that has to be broken.

Originally published as Des Houghton: Time to unleash dogs on drug users at unis, schools and concerts