Pubdate: Tue, 28 Apr 2009
Source: Province, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476
Author: Keith Fraser, The Province
Cited: PHS Community Services Society http://www.communityinsite.ca
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Insite (Insite)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?142 (Supervised Injection Sites)

ADDICTS HAVE NO RIGHT TO INJECT, COURT TOLD

A lawyer for the federal government says it's not the state's job to 
provide safe injection sites and there's no constitutional right for 
addicts to inject illegal drugs.

The comments were made by Robert Frater, a lawyer for the 
attorney-general of Canada, during an appeal of a ruling that allows 
Insite, Vancouver's supervised injection site, to stay open.

Last year, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Ian Pitfield struck down the 
laws prohibiting possession and trafficking of controlled substances, 
as they apply to users on the Insite facility. He found the laws 
prevent access to health-care services for drug addicts.

But Frater told a three-member panel of the B.C. Court of Appeal that 
the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act does not infringe the Charter 
rights of addicts.

"There is no constitutional obligation on the state to provide 
supervised injection rooms, and there is no constitutional right to 
inject scheduled drugs," he said.

Frater said Pitfield erred in several ways in his analysis of the 
Charter rights involved and argued the harms to addicts were created 
by their use of the drugs, not by the laws.

But Joseph Arvay, a lawyer for the PHS Community Services Society, 
which runs Insite, argued that Frater "completely mischaracterized" 
the position of Insite and the trial judge.

"He's set up a straw man in order to shoot it down," he said. "Where 
a law, and particularly a criminal law, stands between seriously ill 
people and the health care they need, that law deprives those people 
of their rights to life and security of their person."

Arguments continue today in what is expected to be a three-day hearing. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake