'DRUG STATE' UNWANTED, GRIM TITLE

THE sombre news that South Australia appears to be the amphetamine
manufacturing capital of Australia is grim tidings indeed.

The report in today's Sunday Mail revealing Australian Crime
Commission data showing that, per capita, we have more clandestine
drug laboratories detected than anywhere else in the nation is a
peephole into a shadowy world of broken lives, organised crime and
misery.

Forget this notion of amphetamines being "recreational" drugs, which
seems to convey a rosy image of fun times and no risk.

These are dangerous drugs, being cooked up by criminals in makeshift
laboratories with no quality control in a nasty money-making venture.

They are drugs that can take control of lives, wreck relationships,
careers and health while organised crime syndicates such as violent
outlaw motorcycle gangs grow more powerful on the profits.

Drug-affected people can turn dangerously violent, while home-made
laboratories are a serious hazard to unsuspecting neighbours with the
risk of explosions and fires.

There is no upside.

The one bright note in this data is that the rise in detection of
illicit drug laboratories, up from 25 in 2004/05 to 65 last year, is
partly the result of diligent police work.

Whether the number of such labs is growing faster than the rate of
detection is the big question, with speculation SA is becoming a drug
manufacturing base for other states.

Our law enforcement agencies need strong community and political
support to continue their efforts to detect and close down suburban
drug laboratories and to break up the callous organised crime rings
behind them.

Equally, the wider community needs to make what effort it can to make
amphetamines unfashionable or irrelevant.

While there is a demand, there will always be a parasite ready to cook
up a supply.