Pubdate: Thu, 20 May 1999 Source: Illawarra Mercury (Australia) Copyright: Illawarra Newspapers Contact: http://mercury.illnews.com.au/ SHOOTING GALLERY, HEROIN TRIAL BOOST Shaw Suports Working Group's Resolution Controversial proposals to legalise shooting galleries and conduct heroin trials have been given a major boost at the NSW drug summit in Sydney. State Attorney-General Jeff Shaw agreed to a preliminary resolution carried late Tuesday night, by a working group he chaired, to trial safe injecting rooms and the legal prescription of heroin. And paramedic Jim Porter yesterday told delegates the Government was putting the lives of ambulance workers at risk by refusing to make shooting galleries legal. Drug summit delegates came face to face with the casualties of drug addiction yesterday during site visits to rehabilitation centres around Sydney. During one visit to the drug hot spot of Cabramatta, in Sydney's south-west, a heroin user collapsed in front of delegates and had to be treated by a paramedic. The suggestion by delegates, including National Drug and Alcohol Research Council director Professor Wayne Hall and Law Society President Margaret Hole, to look at drug reforms comes in the face of opposition by Premier Bob Carr and Prime Minister John Howard. Mr Carr has opposed safe injecting rooms, a recommendation made by Justice James Wood after he investigated police corruption. But Mr Porter said the Government was not fulfilling its duties under occupational health and safety laws. The closing down of so-called shooting galleries at Kings Cross sex shops on an order from police during the state election campaign had made ambulance officers' jobs more dangerous, by making them more vulnerable to being accidentally jabbed by HIV or Hepatitis C-infected needles, he said. Mr Porter described the plight of walking into ``dilapidated houses with no electricity, huge amounts of uncapped needles, walking up and down stairs with treads missing, no floorboards''. His call followed a resolution from a working party chaired by Mr Shaw considering ways of breaking the drugs and crime cycle. The working party found the Health Department should trial ``appropriately supervised self-administration facilities'' and the prescription of heroin. On other issues, the working party said police should be allowed to caution offenders carrying small amounts of cannabis for personal use. The working party said jail penalties for possessing and cultivating cannabis, and for having equipment to take the drug, should be removed. The resolutions were opposed by two senior Liberal delegates - Opposition spokesman on legal affairs Chris Hartcher and treasury spokesman Peter Debnam. Labor's Member for Bathurst Gerard Martin expressed reservations about the resolution for safe injecting rooms and magistrate Craig Thompson opposed the removal of jail terms for cannabis offences. The resolutions must now be voted on by a special resolutions group, which will make recommendations to the Government on its drug policy at the end of the summit. - --- MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart