A JUMP in drug offences across the Latrobe Valley has been used as the basis for a State Opposition push to see drug awareness staff reinstated in the education system.
Shadow Education Parliamentary Secretary Colin Brooks said police data from the 2012/13 period showing a “steep increase” in drug crime in the Valley – a 14 per cent rise to 447 offences – and other reports of ‘ice’ methamphetamine use reaching “crisis proportions in Victoria”, were evidence of the need for drug education positions.
The Express reported this week that police had warned of a ‘bad batch’ of drugs circulating in the Valley, following two suspected overdoses in Traralgon last week leading to the death of one man and the need to place another man in an induced coma.
Mr Brooks said it was vital children were armed with the “knowledge and confidence to make the right decisions when they come into contact with drugs”.
He accused the State Government of “taking the axe to all 18 drug education positions within the education department” which, until January this year, were spread throughout the nine regions across Victoria.
He said the officers “worked with all schools in their respective regions to ensure that effective drug education was provided to students”.
In the government’s defence State Member for Morwell Russell Northe said the department had released a new suite of drug education curriculum resources for students in years seven to nine earlier this year.
He said the Get Ready Drug and Alcohol Education Program was an “award-winning evidence-based drug education curriculum”.
Mr Northe said department staff formerly known as drug education officers continued to work in regional offices “providing support and advice to schools to continue to deliver drug education to Victoria’s 555,000 students”.
While Mr Brooks warned students had now lost the expertise of drug education officers, through “short-sighted cuts” which left children “dangerously exposed”, Mr Northe insisted the officers’ new roles enabled them to “provide better support and broker solutions for vulnerable young people” including those “at risk of having issues related to drug or alcohol use”.
Mr Northe said there had been no reduction to funding but Mr Brooks said education had been the subject of “savage cuts” and drug education officers were one of the casualties.
