Time for Change Survey and Report

32 Recommendation #11 We recommend that all Australian governments ensure a balanced and equitable investment in drug policy spending across the 3-pillars, and commit to a reinvestment of funds to appropriately resource demand reduction and harm reduction, consistent with the o stensible goals of Australia’s National Drug Strategy. We further recommend that the Australian Government implements Recommendations 2 and 3 of the Joint Committee on Law Enforcement’s Australia’s illicit drug problem: Challenges and opportunities for law enforcement inquiry repor t. 11 Respondents also commented further on how overdose prevention could be significantly managed by regulating supply, reinvesting funds spent on criminalisation, and therefore addressing harms associated with unregulated markets: “Prohibition does not reduce overdoses, the best solution for overdose is legal supplies of regulated drugs! If there was a regulated, legal supply of all drugs the massive savings that would occur in the health sector would be almost enough to effectively fund harm and demand reduction programs. Add the savings to the justice/criminal services and money wasted on supply reduction, the government would have an entirely new stream of revenue so large that wouldn’t have a valid reason to introduce the heavy taxes that are imposed on currently legal substances like alcohol and tobacco!! Drug dependence is the only health issue listed in the DSM that is also a criminal offence.” “Wipe out supply reduction & invest that funding into harm, treatment & peer based initiatives. Complete review of demand reduction strategies” Australia’s National Drug Strategy 2017 -2026 is based on a three-pillar approach — supply reduction, demand reduction, and harm reduction — yet government investment remains heavily skewed towards law enforcement. Over 65% of funding is allocated to supply reduction, while demand reduction receives just over 30%, and harm reduction accounts for less than 2% (1.6%). A recent national report from the Drug Policy Modelling Program at UNSW estimated that of the $5.5 billion spent annually on drug policy, $3.5 billion is directed towards law enforcement, including $1.8 billion on routine street-level policing, while only $90 million is spent on harm reductio n 12 . Public sentiment strongly supports a more balanced approach, with this survey showing that 96.5% of respondents favour greater investment in harm reduction. 11 Commonwealth of Australia (2024) ‘Australia’s Illicit Drug Problem: Challenges and opportunities for law enforcement’ Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement . Available here. 12 Ritter A, Grealy M, Kelaita P & Kowalski M (2024) The Australian ‘drug budget’: Government drug policy expenditure 2021/22. DPMP Monograph No. 36. Sydney: Social Policy Research Centre, UNSW . Available here.