KnowYourStuffNZ has been carrying out drug checking at festivals for five years. In that time, we have helped thousands of festival-goers to make safer and more informed decisions. We help people avoid the most dangerous drugs and, if they choose to use a substance, we help them to be safer. We have had huge support from punters, festival organisers, medics, Police, MPs from both sides of Parliament, three Prime Ministers, and the Minister of Police Stuart Nash.
Seemingly the only person who doesn’t like us is Darroch Ball. He’s the Law and Order Spokesperson from New Zealand First. Yeah, we’d never heard of him either until he decided to get in our way. He’s blocking changes to the Misuse of Drugs Act that would support a national rollout of drug checking.
Darroch said that “We’re being very reactionary if we think that it’s ok to start saving lives or to start protecting people”.
Darroch thinks that people should suffer if they break the law, even if that means they die from taking a pill. Darroch thinks his moral stance is more important than kids’ lives.
Seriously, we’re having an argument about whether we should save people’s lives or not. What the hell, Darroch?
Darroch thinks that drug checking doesn’t work, ignoring twenty years of experience in Europe and five years of our work in New Zealand. That evidence is clear – drug checking reduces risky behaviour and the harm from drug use.
Darroch thinks that drug checking normalises and condones drug taking. That horse has already bolted, with 80% of young New Zealanders admitting to trying illegal substances. There is also no evidence from studies over the last twenty years to suggest that drug checking leads to increases in drug use. We’ve told Darroch this, but he ignores the evidence and continues to push this line.
Currently the law around drug checking is unclear. That’s stopping us from providing our service at New Zealand’s largest festivals. We want that law clarified, as does Stuart Nash. The blockage for that legal change isn’t New Zealand First. The blockage is Darroch Ball.
High-dose MDMA pills containing two or three times the standard dose have killed a number of young people in the UK and Australia. KnowYourStuffNZ’s data shows that these pills are available in New Zealand as well. It is only a matter of time before one of Aotearoa’s young people dies. When that happens, Darroch Ball will have blood on his hands.