Drug researchers push for injecting rooms in Melbourne’s suburbs
A consortium of drug researchers are pressuring the state government to set up supervised injecting rooms in several suburbs.
Along with the injecting room proposed for the CBD, researchers from the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, which is funded by the federal government, are calling for facilities in Footscray, St Kilda and Frankston.
Shadow Minister for Mental Health Emma Kealy says the Richmond injecting room has “attracted a lot of problems”.
“I think there’s better solutions,” she told Neil Mitchell.
“It doesn’t offer the support that the local community needs, and it hasn’t reached its objectives. Even the minister now admits it has brought upon the area some problems with amenity that the government needs to focus on.
“We can’t have Labor’s model around the injecting room rolled out across the state.
“It hasn’t worked in Richmond, it won’t work anywhere else.”
Premier Daniel Andrews says his government won’t make a decision on the CBD facility until former top cop Ken Lay has finalised a report on potential locations, a process which Ms Kealy says has taken too long.
Press PLAY below to hear why Ms Kealy says the plan ‘won’t work’