Andrew Dickens: The country needs to go to rehab

Andrew Dickens Afternoons

There’s a common factor to the stories that made the headlines over the past few days and that commonality is drugs.
Firstly the immense growth in numbers of gang members in New Zealand. According to the police there are 6729 patched or prospect gang members in this country. That’s a rise of nearly 26 per cent over the last two years.
It’s an incredible number. 1386 new gang members in just two years. Simon Bridges says it’s because the Labour led government is soft on crime, which I find personally to be the most laughable thing he’s said lately. They’re soft on some crime but it ain’t gangs. Look at what happened over those same 2 years.
There have been 10 per cent more officers added over that time. By next year 700 officers will be specifically assigned to police organised crime and gangs. Add to that the 1200 offenders deported from Australia in those same 2 years many of whom are gang members. The Comancheros have been formed in that time.
The fact is we have more police fighting more gang members. But the other driver is that the gang’s core business of selling methamphetamine has gone through the roof. Police estimate the gangs sell half a billion dollars of P a year. One and a half tonnes of meth have been seized this year alone.
Our predilection for speed and it’s variants is one of the highest in the world and that breeds the gangs.
Drugs were also to blame for the hospitalisation of five and insanely dangerous behaviour at an Auckland dance party on Friday. The floor of Mount Smart Stadium was littered with the evidence of of little plastic bags that held the pills that are rotting our society.
Then there was the terrible tragedy of the Dunedin house party. The house was packed to bursting point with 600 people and when the police arrived there was a panic. You don’t panic unless you’re doing something wrong. I’m picking there were a lot of kids there with stuff in their pockets they didn’t want the cops to find. While this is speculation from my part at the same time the past five years I have had numerous people contacting me concerned about the rise of drugs at tertiary institutions.
We have a double standard around drugs as seen by the push for a cannabis referendum.
We tolerate and even enjoy their presence in our society while being blind to the way they drive on the undesirable sectors in our country. We really need to get straight. The country needs to go to rehab.

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