Senate debates

Wednesday, 6 September 2017

Questions without Notice

Drug and Alcohol Abuse

2:29 pm

Photo of Skye Kakoschke-MooreSkye Kakoschke-Moore (SA, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Health, Senator Nash. During the Senate inquiry into the government's welfare reform bill, Professor Alison Ritter of the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre told me, 'There is a model that I worked on that developed state-by-state estimates of unmet demand for alcohol and other drugs treatment. Those data are theoretically available. The Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy said we were not able to release those results and they were not to be made available to anyone who requested them.' Professor Ritter advised the direction to not make the information public occurred in 2014 and again about 12 months ago. Professor Ritter went on to state that, in her opinion, the concern from the ministerial council was that it would identify the substantial responsibility that the states and territories and the Commonwealth government needed to start to take in relation to the appalling situation in relation to drug treatment. Will the government table in the Senate the model and the technical manual referred to by Professor Ritter and, if not, why not?

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