Pill testing
David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (12:15): (791) My question is for the Minister for Mental Health and is related to data from the drug-checking service trial. As the minister knows, I am not opposed to this service in principle, although I do think that the government should have taken the opportunity of a free trial rather than taxpayers funding it. Nevertheless, the service has been established now and the government thinks it is going well, as they have been quoting selected data in the media to justify this claim. I like to see things for myself, though. That is the reason I went out there to inspect the service, and it is also the reason I attend so many protests and other events to see things for myself in person. But I cannot see this data and neither can the rest of the public, so my question for the minister is: will there be a public release of data from the drug-checking service at Beyond the Valley?
Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (12:16): I thank Mr Limbrick for his question and his interest in not only our pill-testing reforms but our AOD strategy more broadly across the state. It was wonderful to see Beyond the Valley as the first festival where pill testing operated. I have given some high-level data from that event, but just for the benefit of the house, there were more than 700 predominantly younger Victorians who accessed the service during the festival, and that is the largest number of any festival around the country that has a similar type of testing program in place. Seventy per cent of those young people had never had a conversation with a health professional about their drug use previously – so an important opportunity for education. Forty per cent said they would consume a smaller amount of drugs, and one in six intended to discard their drugs altogether. They are obviously high-level stats from the first festival that we have been out to.
I did just the other day announce the next four festivals where pill testing will occur: this Saturday at Hardmission in Werribee and at Pitch, Ultra and the Warehouse Project over the next few months. We have always said that the trial over this summer and next summer is an opportunity to test the model and to find out what the best way forward is for a permanent arrangement post the trial, and that will be the subject of not only data gathering but also an evaluation process that my department will coordinate. We have got every intention of not only continuing the testing service but also learning as we go. I think that there were some early learnings from the first festival that we were at around how to manage demand during the day at a multiday festival. I am sure there will be other learnings out of single-day events – particularly Hardmission tomorrow at Werribee – that are going to have a lot of people attending.
It is a continuous process. That evaluation will be done in a rigorous way, as it always is by my department, and we will take those learnings. The government has got no issue with being transparent about how this testing program is going. I will say that the early indications are very encouraging, and this is about providing that vital information but also about saving lives.
David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (12:19): I thank the minister for her answer, although I am not sure the minister actually answered when the data will be released. Nevertheless, I think that it is really important that this kind of data is transparently published with as much information as possible and appropriate – acknowledging that there is some information that would not be appropriate to publish – because this is a trial, and if there are aspects that might not be working well or raise some questions, we should not shy away from having those discussions. So my question to the minister is: will the minister commit to ensuring that broad and comprehensive data is published as soon as possible after future events?
Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (12:20): I thank the member for the supplementary question, and I have got absolutely no problem with, in principle, what you are saying. Of course some of the data is confidential in nature. It is a confidential service, so we need to acknowledge that and make sure that any data that we do release is de-identified.
Georgie Crozier interjected.
Ingrid STITT: Ms Crozier, I will take up that interjection because I am actually in the process of answering a question around whether the government will provide data, and the government has got no interest in hiding data that is about saving lives. So I want to give everyone in the house an assurance that this is about making sure that we get the best possible model going forward and that we learn the lessons from the trial, and of course data collection is an important part of that, not least of which is strengthening our drug alerts surveillance system, which is an important part of the AOD service that we provide.