John MacDonald: I'm meh about the meth plan. But at least it's something.

At least they’re doing something. But I don’t rate the chances of it working. That’s how I’m feeling about the Government’s declaration of war on methamphetamine, with this new plan that will see spy agencies working with customs and the defence force to target ships carrying drugs in the Pacific. It's also going to work with ports and the shipping industry. The feature of the plan that I like most is this $30 million increase in funding for addiction services. Because, as the Drug Foundation is saying, we can’t arrest our way out of the meth problem. Sarah Helm is executive director and she says help for people caught up in meth addiction has been significantly under-funded for many years. She says: “It’s clear to everyone that we can’t arrest our way out of this issue. Spending on treatment and harm reduction is also a better investment of taxpayer money than criminalising people, because it results in savings downstream in health, justice and social costs.” And we know about the cost - $19.4 million a week. That’s what the National Drug Intelligence Bureau estimates is the value of the harm caused by methamphetamine use every week in New Zealand. That’s the cost of things like people ending up in hospital, dying - all the social harm. Just under $20 million a week. The Government’s plan also includes a four-year advertising campaign to educate people about the dangers of meth use. Which I’m not convinced will be effective. Because everyone knows how bad meth is already - and still we’re using more of it than we ever have. It's been about 25 years since methamphetamine - as we know it - really took off in New Zealand. And it’s turned out to be a great market for the suppliers. Some numbers I’ve seen the police refer to is how someone can bring-in 600 kilos of the stuff for a couple of million dollars, sell it and make a profit of around $120 million. So who is going to turn their back on that kind of opportunity? But, even though I don’t see it changing things greatly, good on the Government for trying something. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.