In the Australian state of Victoria a storm is brewing over the impending release of legislation to deal with the controversial problem of “chroming”. Chroming is the inhalation of dangerous substances in order to experience a temporary high. Spray paint is the most common substance inhaled, although glue and other forms of paint are also used. The spray paint is sprayed into a plastic bag which is then placed over the mouth of the user, who inhales the fumes and gets a high.
The Victorian government has announced plans to introduce legislation that will increase police powers in a bid to crackdown on chroming. Participants at a chroming conference put on by the Victorian Department of Human Services on May 24 were told that legislation would be introduced that would give police substantially increased powers, “including detaining a young person while transporting them to a parent or guardian or to a youth drug and alcohol service,” according to Victorian Attorney General Rob Hulls. This plan has meet with widespread condemnation from many quarters of the Victorian community, including the Victorian Police, who see this strategy as “criminalizing a health problem.”
Chroming is a significant problem for young Indigenous people in Victoria, and elsewhere in Australia. Margaret Stuart, the Director of the Victorian Aboriginal Youth Support Program believes that chroming is “a real big problem … it is unknown, fickle, it is our biggest worry.” According to the Drug Information Clearinghouse, serious health concerns associated with chroming include “sudden sniffing death, caused by a total heart failure, permanent brain damage and blindness.”
The Victorian government has struggled with the challenge of chroming because the legality and widespread availability of the substances used means it is very difficult to control the supply of the substances. The policy discussed last Thursday is an attempt to address that challenge, but it is seen by many observers as a weak and vague response to a very tough problem. One senior public servant heavily involved in the chroming debate commented, on the condition of anonymity, that it was “faceless policy, one that doesn’t offend anyone too much but doesn’t really face up to the real problems.”
The central plank of the new policy is granting police the power to detain children who are found to be chroming, and to transport them to a safe place such as a drug and alcohol drop-in center. This power has been referred to as a ‘civil detention’ power, rather than arrest power. This is an important distinction, as the authorities see it. Victorian Health Minister Bronwyn Pike told reporters in a media release dated March 18, 2003, that “the government would follow the committee’s recommendation not to criminalize the practice of chroming, as it was likely to be counterproductive.” When questioned as to why civil detention powers weren’t arrest powers, Inspector Steven James, Manager of the Victorian Police Drug and Alcohol Strategy Unit, responded, “The Victorian Police has flagged their concern about the criminalization of what is basically a health issue.” He went on to explain that chroming is “an issue for health, it is something that they should be equipped to deal with, we shouldn’t be using the long arm of the law.”
David Murray from the Victorian Youth Substance Abuse Service believes that this power will be a “pointless exercise of power and will be counterproductive.” He pointed out that chroming is almost always part of “adolescent experimental behavior” and is generally caused by other factors such as physical and mental abuse or mental health issues, none of which “have been seriously addressed by this policy so far.” He also warned that there is a big danger of young people who are detained under these powers, “reacting negatively to any attempted detention, and this can lead to other charges such as resisting arrest, abusive language and so on.”
Ten years ago the Royal Commission investigation into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody recommended that the government take steps to “reduce the number of people coming into custody in the first place.” This approach of “breaking the cycle” of incarceration is at risk due to the proposed changes in police powers, according to Margaret Stuart. Ms. Stuart believes that this further erosion of the recommendations of the Royal Commission is a growing problem in the Victorian justice system. “Ten years ago everyone was aware of the recommendations,” she said. “That has gone by the by, we have come to a stand still.”
The government itself highlighted this concern in late 2002 when the parliamentary committee examining chroming first handed down its findings. The Age Newspaper reported on October 23, 2002, that the then Health Minister John Thwaites was concerned about the proposed detention powers. The minister was quoted as saying, “Such powers needed proper safeguards to ensure they conformed with the proper recommendations of the Aboriginal Deaths in Custody Royal Commission.” Given the imminent approval of these detention powers it appears that the Victorian government believes that the use of civil detention powers and the principle of transporting youths, including Indigenous youths, to safe places, rather than lock-ups, provides these safeguards.
Police, youth, drug workers, and the Koori community in Victoria are now nervously awaiting the final release of chroming legislation by the state government. Despite Mr. Hulls’ claim that it is “not the intention of the new laws to bring children into contact with the criminal justice system,” David Murray is pessimistically predicting that due to the Victorian Governments inability to come up with a solution to chroming that does not depended on the use of force by police, Aboriginal youths are going to suffer the consequences of “a law and order approach to a health problem.”
Lachlan Harris is a correspondent with the Koori Mail.
