For goodness sake! There are no "Mr Bigs" but there are many many Mr Mediums that come and go. Absolute waste of time and we are attacking the wrong end of the problem.
Let's supply drugs to those that want them which would cost one thousandth of what we spend on the current system.
Addicts would have to be prevented from having kids and they can be buzzing or in a stupour for all I care. You lose your driving licence of course and if imprisoned it would only be stupefying drugs allowed.
I watched an Ice addict in the Melbourne Magistrates court give continuing employment to one Magistrate, one social worker,two lawyers and about four coppers! Wow wouldn't it be so much easier to give him what he wants and help him on his destructive path? As well as ensuring he could not keep the whole mess going with his kids.

J BOWYER...

There's quite a bit of legitimacy in what you've said - decriminalize most drugs, and provide meaningful treatment for those individuals who're hopelessly caught-up in the culture and use of illegal drugs per se. Gaol should only be mandated for the pusher and supplier - with life, without parole for the supplier. The pusher receives 25 years no parole, with a second offence attracting the same penalty as the supplier. Interestingly if you kill the head, the body will surely perish. Punishing the user alone gets you nowhere, other then entrenched resentment.

Ho hum...ice is way down the list of most pressing addictions. Alcohol leads the field of addictive damage by a country mile.
Statistics can lie of course, but here is one statistic for hospital treatments of addicts:

40 percent ....Alcohol
24 percent.....Cannabis
17 percent.....Methamphetamines (includes ice).
7 percent.......Heroin

As opposed to a common view, cannabis is quite problematic.
And most amusingly (on these pages), alcohol remains the darling drug of the masses!

I scoff

Clearly there are Mr Bigs and they should be handed to the Philippine or Indonesian Authorities, replete with a large sample of their illicit wares, for their more permanent remedy.

Some incredibly asinine folk think that all drugs are equal, when plainly they're not! Ice reducing the addicts to mindless, extremely violent, knuckle dragging netherendals!

Ask any Nurse in any psyche ward, or Ambo or ER Doctor!

Alcohol can lead to lifetime dependency and some serious health problems, violence and ultimate penury!

Heroin, on the other hand, only becomes a health risk when it is overused, or used in shared needles, but if keep in manageable (recreational) doses seems to impair little? Least of all cognitive ability?

And is very rarely accompanied by downward mood swings or violence? And who are (often high ranking, well-to-do) users from all walks of life, may surprise!

It's is mostly overdoses that kill? Party drugs not completely safe nor are magic mushrooms!

Marijuana may cause an acceleration in some psychosis/paranoia, but other than that comes with the same risks, it would seem, as also smoked addictive tobacco.

Medical cannabis seems, at first glance, to be useful as a medication for a number of conditions?

While I've sympathy for the decriminalization of most drugs, that can't ever include ice!

There are no happy ending nor benign results in it use! Just endless addiction and horribly altered dehumanized personalities!

We must get on top of this scourge and eliminate it at source!

And Mr Bigs, all of them, need a long drop on a short rope, or a swan dive from a chopper mid Pacific, minus the mae west! Elliot Ness, where are you? And but were there no Mr Bigs! Just shark bait!

Preferably before the courts and big money allow them back on the streets infecting our kids with their noxious poison!

Big money being more persuasive in poorer countries, with patently corrupt law enforcement and or jurisprudence than here!?
Alan B.

DIVER DAN I couldn't agree with you more! Alcohol has a far more injurious impact upon all demographics within society, than any other drug of dependency has. Purely because of it's availability, and this notion held by many of our young people, to become inebriated as cheaply and quickly as possible, thus removing any and all inhibitions one might have, as a consequence of their convoluted and impenetrable lifestyles. The additional benefit of being 'pissed' utterly out of your head, is an enormous release of both physical and emotional tension brought about, by their very busy lives.

Still DIVER DAN, though I completely agree with you, I think the thread was more precisely directed to the scourge of 'ICE' and other mind altering drugs. Drugs that seemingly have escaped all attempts, by the coppers and other authorities, from significantly curbing it's chemical constituents from being successfully imported into Oz? Your point nevertheless, is totally correct.

I sung wu..
Addictions are interesting phenomenas. There are heavy drinkers who are not addicts for example: and light drinkers who are addicted, that's also a phenomena of the drinking set.
I think alcohol may be losing out to new age drugs of addiction; a bit like the demise of the corner pub.

Of course the other sad addition to modern life, is its insistence on retaining our youths in a permanent cycle of education and training. It really appears to be an end in itself. There was once a thing called a job with a prospect: All pretty futureless and unfulfilling.
On the other hand, a high predominance of ice addicts appear among blue collar workers: Those with a future, one would think. Thus, Western Australia blips large on the ice radar.

What this drug epidemic, (and I include all drugs), signifies to me, is the end of the traditional Australian culture. This country has been re-engineered towards foreigners. Interestingly, the cohort taking the greatest advantage of the cultural shift in Australia, are the Chinese.
Paradoxically though, it's is the Chinese featuring as the main importers of the drug ice.

Seems to this little black duck, the Chinese are hedging their bets by hastening the end of any White oppositional culture.