The NSW Labor government will continue to use sniffer dogs and strip-searches at music festivals, despite the recommendations of a report it commissioned earlier this year.
That report, released in April, listed 56 recommendations to reduce drug-related harm at festivals, including a ban on the use of drug dogs and strip-searches at events where pill testing is being trialled.
While the government introduced pill testing at some events, including at Yours and Owls festival back in March, NSW Police Minister Yasmin Catley said the stance on sniffer dogs and drug searches hasn’t changed.
“We’re not changing it,” Catley said, per The Guardian, adding that the two methods of drug detection are important “investigative tools for the NSW Police” at music festivals.
The government ignoring the advice of the report comes in light of last month’s successful class action against NSW Police over the unlawful strip-search of an attendee at Splendour in the Grass in 2018 — a landmark ruling that awarded Raya Meredith $93,000.
Asked about that ruling in terms of the government’s continuation of strip-searches, Catley said the matter is “all before the court at the moment, and we need to wait until that process continues and concludes”.
Catley still reiterated the government’s support for pill testing, saying police “are genuinely wanting to do the trial of pill testing [and] get the evidence so that we are making good, sound policy decisions going forward”.
At the time of its release, the initial report was praised by industry leaders like Redfern Legal Centre solicitor Sam Lee, who said, “to keep the community safe, strip-searches and drug dogs should be banned completely for suspicion of minor drug possession”.
However, in a statement per The Guardian this week, Lee described the government’s failure to adopt the advice around strip-searches and sniffer dogs, particularly in light of the class action ruling, as “shameful”.
The NSW government has long been hesitant to introduce music festival harm-reduction measures like those suggested in the report, but last year launched a 12-month pill testing trial after years drug-related festival deaths.
Of the report’s 56 recommendations — including others around the expansion of safe injecting clinics and a medical defence for people who use medically prescribed cannabis and drive — the government said it would support 36.
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