Heads, Parents Against Changes

The Age

Wednesday April 10, 1996

Alex Messina

Principals and a parents' group have come out strongly against the recommendations to legalise marijuana use and integrate education about illegal drugs into school curriculums.

The head of the State and National Principals Association, Mr Duncan Stalker, said the history of drug education in schools was a total failure.

The Victorian Federation of State School Parents Clubs said parents were not ready to accept that students of any age could walk into a school ground with a marijuana cigarette and not be breaking the law.

The Premier's drug advisory council yesterday recommended education about illegal hard drugs should be incorporated into primary and secondary curriculums.

However, the council found no evidence of illegal drug use in schools during school hours.

But the report's recommendations, which would decriminalise personal use of marijuana, would make it legal for students to carry small amounts of marijuana to school.

However, selling of any quantity of marijuana for any price would remain illegal.

One of the council members, Associate Professor Margaret Hamilton, director of the Turning Point Drug and Alcohol Centre, yesterday urged parents to see this in the light of the fact that 50 per cent of students already try marijuana before leaving secondary school.

Also, legalising marijuana would simply put the already widely used drug on the same footing as alcohol and tobacco, which students can now legally take to school.

``We would not be encouraging schools to condone that," Professor Hamilton said. ``Schools would develop their own policies about marijuana on school grounds, just as they do with alcohol and tobacco." While half of all students experimented with marijuana it did not mean they would become habitual users, nor ought they be branded criminals for experimenting.

     Drug use by year-11 students in Victoria
     .              Boys       Girls
     Marijuana      47.8%      37%
     Hallucinogens  12.9%      7.9%
     Amphetamines   9.7%       7.5%
     Cocaine        4.5%       3.3%
     Opiates        4.3%       2.8%
     Steroids       3.7%       0.5%
     Ecstasy        3.9%       2.6%
     Any illicit
     drug           49.7%      37.6%

     Source: Department of Health and Community
     Services, 1992 figures