NT abandons 'prison farms for drunks'

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Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Broadcast: 13/06/2013

Reporter: Kerry Brewster

The Northern Territory Government has backed away from locking up alcohol abusers in so-called "prison farms for drunks".


EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: The Northern Territory Government has toned down its radical alcohol policies that will lock people up in so-called "prison farms for drunks".

The Prime Minister recently wrote to the NT Chief Minister Adam Giles, accusing his government of abdicating its responsibility to reduce alcohol abuse.

The Territory Government says it has now made 26 changes to its contentious legislation, but criminal sanctions remain against alcoholics who repeatedly abscond from mandatory rehabilitation.

Shortly I'll be speaking with Adam Giles, but first this report from Kerry Brewster.

KERRY BREWSTER, REPORTER: Each day in Alice Springs a significant proportion of the population wakes up desperate for a drink.

PATRICK NANDY, FORMER FOOTBALLER: It's like you're going to hell once you touch the grog.

KERRY BREWSTER: Former champion footballer Patrick Nandy has been fighting addiction for 30 years. He's currently in voluntary day rehab.

PATRICK NANDY: All my families, most of them are on dialysis 'cause the grog got the best of 'em.

KERRY BREWSTER: Elders like Sabella Turner despair.

SABELLA TURNER, ARRERNTE ELDER: The grog is doing a lotta damages, a lotta hatred, a lot of fighting. It causes a lot of chaos.

KERRY BREWSTER: At around 16 litres of pure alcohol per person per year, the town ranks as a world booze capital, it's alcohol-related mortality rate 31 times higher than the national average.

JOHN BOFFA, PEOPLE'S ALCOHOL ACTION COALITION: People talk about a tsunami in terms of the impact that alcohol's having, in terms of violence, harms, damage in terms of child development and early childhood. It's a very, very serious a major public health issue here in Central Australia.

KERRY BREWSTER: The Territory Government promises an end to public drunkenness by using radical laws to put drunks in locked, guarded rehab centres for months at a time. But the plan has come under increasing criticism from the Federal Government, doctors and lawyers and Aboriginal elders.

SABELLA TURNER: They're gonna get sad, ya know, and unhappy and then when it gets that, mix that together and you explode. Anxiety, depression, stress - that'll be all chaos. It's unimaginable.

RUSSEL GOLDFLAM, PRESIDENT, NT CRIMINAL LAWYERS ASSOC.: Well it's quite clear from the rhetoric of the politicians in the Country Liberal Party government that one their agenda is a desire to make the streets look cleaner. They've complained about the fact that we've got lots of ugly drunks, and we have, but you don't fix that health problem by turning all of those people into a class of criminals.

KERRY BREWSTER: Today the Health Minister announced several compromises, including to the most contentious plan to send rehab escapees to the Territory's overcrowded jails.

ROBYN LAMBLEY, NT HEALTH MINISTER: We've decided to put in a more graded response, and we hope it's a rare event, if they abscond, they will simply be brought back to the facility. The second time they will be brought back to the facility. And on the third occasion, it will be an offence.

KERRY BREWSTER: The changes have not satisfied the Australian Medical Association.

PETER BEAUMONT, AUST. MEDICAL ASSOC.: There is still jail at the end of the line and jail still is detrimental and we're quite disappointed that the criminal aspect has not been dropped.

KERRY BREWSTER: In a letter sent two days ago to the NT's Chief Minister Adam Giles, Prime Minister Julia Gillard strongly criticised the Territory's alcohol policies.

JULIA GILLARD, PRIME MINISTER (letter to Adam Giles, female voiceover): "As you would know, the criminalisation of public drunkenness contributed to the over-representation of aboriginal people in prison in the 1970s and 1980s. A return to this kind of policy would be contrary to the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Black Deaths in Custody."

JOHN BOFFA: Alcohol treatment itself is no answer to the alcohol problem, because across the board the success rate of alcohol treatment is not great. We have to have supply reduction measures. We have to complement any treatment system with things like an alcohol floor price. We have to reduce takeaway trading hours. We have to restrict large volume purchases of alcohol.

KERRY BREWSTER: The Prime Minister accused the Chief Minister of allowing "rivers of grog" to flow again.

More VB beer is reportedly sold through Alice's notorious Todd River Tavern than almost any other pub in Australia.

Extra bar staff were hired, according to alcohol expert Dr John Boffa, when the CLP Government scrapped the Banned Drinkers' Register, which had made it illegal for thousands of chronic drinkers to buy alcohol.

JOHN BOFFA: All of a sudden 2,500 people who'd been banned across the NT overnight were given back full access to alcohol. We immediately saw more people - more drunk people in the streets again, in the riverbed.

SABELLA TURNER: It is getting worse. A lot of people admitted into hospital, using all these health centres. It's heartbreaking because I work within the community and I see it.

KERRY BREWSTER: Alice Springs Hospital got a new emergency wing this week. But doctors have been ordered not to speak publicly about leaked data showing a significant increase in alcohol-related admissions.

From the day the Banned Drinkers Register was removed there's been a doubling in the proportion of alcohol-related presentations to the emergency department Alice Springs Hospital. So it's basically gone from a situation of 12.5 per cent of all presentations were alcohol-related to a situation where 25 of all presentations were alcohol-related and the effect is instantaneous, and it's very strong evidence - prima facie, if you like - that there has been a very negative effect of removing the BDR.

KERRY BREWSTER: But ending the Banned Drinkers Register was key CLP election promise. Requiring all Territorians to provide photo ID when buying alcohol, the CLP argued it was a serious encroachment on civil liberties. And since taking the top job, Chief Minister Adam Giles has made clear to the alcohol industry his priorities.

ADAM GILES, NT CHIEF MINISTER (May, 2003): We all know the benefits of the Territory lifestyle, the opportunities and the excitement around having a coldie, whether it's the Daly Waters Pub at Bojangles or at the Humpty Doo Tavern. This is our lifestyle, this is the way we live and we need to continue to ensure that we enshrine that in the way that we operate and we hold that as core social values.

KERRY BREWSTER: No talk of alcohol restrictions or a floor price here.

Kerry Brewster, Lateline.

EDITOR'S NOTE (14 JUNE): The on-screen date shown when Chief Minister Adam Giles addressed a function should have read May 2013, not May 2003.


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